Originally Posted by
Raffles
As I mentioned above, whilst true, the cover you need is still next to nothing compared to US cover. When the NHS sends you a bill, it is a very modest sum - nothing like the ludicrous numbers you would pay in the US. Even hiring a 747 to take you back to the US would not, I imagine, be more than $100,000 so the cover you need, if you are ultra cautious and decide to pay some, is very modest.
And wouldn't your US insurance cover you anyway, as per the poster above?
I'm not even sure about the A&E restrictions, despite what the website says. The UK has had a problem for a long time, for example, of pregnant women from overseas coming here to give birth because the system is free and better than they would receive at home - although I do remember promises a few years ago to clamp down on this.
I recall numerous discussions, website statements from the NHS etc suggesting much more restrictive practice than I experienced. Obviously I do not know the facts. I do know that when I had an emergency in the US no treatment was forthcoming until my spouse could prove payment would be forthcoming. Nothing like that happened in the UK. Even in Brazil treatment comes first, questions later, in public hospitals. Private ones, as in the UK, are far cheaper than there are in the US because they do not have the huge emergency treatment usage as a substitute for routine care, among other things.
From what both London-based posters are suggesting emergency care for foreigners still requires no insurance in the UK. As a few other threads discuss having travel medical insurance (IHI, American Express and lots of others have such) generally is a good idea and is not very expensive. My IHI coverage is about US$120 per year.