(Travel) health insurance for a Moroccan visiting the US?

February 3, 2005 11:16 AM

My boyfriend wants to have his mother from Morocco come visit us in the US. She has some health problems including Diabetes.

Does anyone have any information about how we can get some health insurance for her while she is here visiting just in case we need for some reason seek medical assistance during her stay?
posted by Gooney to travel & transportation around Morocco (4 answers total)

She should probably buy some traveller's insurance before she leaves home. I can't speak for Morocco, but I know that here in Canada it's easy to get, fairly comprehensive, and not that expensive.
posted by orange swan at 11:35 AM on February 3, 2005

I'd be surprised if there's a US insurer that's willing to cover her diabetes or any complications that they could manage to connect back to it. They love to exclude that stuff as a "pre-existing condition". If she has insurance at home, probably best to start by asking them about how to get covered care while she's abroad.
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 3:19 PM on February 3, 2005

I can't imagine any US insurer issuing temporary insurance for a visitor. If they did, they would have to deal with a flood of visitors from countries with less advantaged health care systems using it as an opportunity to reap the benefits of ours. There are only two options that I can think of 1) traveller's insurance from Morroco (I have no idea if that's available). Or 2) get her added as a family member to his policy (really only practical if it will be a long visit.) Best thing I think is to have her come as prepared as possible, scout out inexpensive local clinics for semi-emergencies, and be assured that in a real emergency she won't get worse care as an uninsured person than she would in Morroco. Also, you might want to check out her visa for what it says about her son's liability for any expenses she can't pay while here.
posted by dness2 at 4:44 PM on February 3, 2005

dness nailed it. No insurer will do something like this. USA healthcare is the world's best and there's no one who's going to pay for a traveler to obtain it.

If she has an emergency, any city hospital worth beans will take care of her first and help her apply for emergency Medicaid later to get reimbursed for her visit. Aliens can only get this if they have a life-threatening emergency, though.

Dunno where you are, but most university hospitals have teaching clinics that can be quite good; some of these are starting to require insurance now, though.
posted by ikkyu2 at 5:23 PM on February 3, 2005