Travel Protection Basics

Fact of life: Things don't always go as planned. Unexpected situations can arise even when you think you have it all covered. Ask me: Murphy was a good friend of mine during my time in the military (that’s why I now get my fortune read every year)

I’m not saying “Final Destination” kind of unexpectedness, but we must cover what is necessary, and be ready to adapt to unforeseen circumstances. With a trip spanning numerous countries with different environments, necessary means at least on the basic level, insurance and vaccinations.

Insurance

Although we tell everybody how important travel insurance is, we do occasionally neglect to purchase it before some of our trips, sometimes conveniently, so as to save money. This time however, despite the high costs, we know it’s a must.

That said, I don’t know what else to tell you other than the fact that after scouring through most of the insurance sites, I realised that none of the traditional travel insurance policies could cover our trip. Let me briefly explain.

I searched through the standard sites: AIG, MSIG, AIA, AXA, NTUC, PRUDENTIAL and found that there are only 2 types of travel insurance: Single and Annual.

Single Trip – valid for a single trip up to 180 days

Annual Cover (the more affordable option if you travel often across the year) – valid for trips no longer than 90 consecutive days

CASE CLOSED. NOTHING provides for a RTW trip longer than 180 days. I even tried to cheat a little by limiting the trip to 180 days, but the quotes started looking a little scary, even with their various coverage exclusions.

*Note: GoBear is a pretty good website for insurance comparisons with some partnership discounts during certain periods.

Interestingly, there’s this insurance company called WorldNomads that sells travel insurance only. As part of their customer experience they also provide insights and advice about countries, provide scholarships to aspiring travel writers and filmmakers, and also take a CSR angle to it. Pretty cool company I must say.

So I’m not going to bullshit you that I read through every detail before I made the purchase (it’s the only option available that could cover our trip), but I did give some consideration to it (obviously cause it wasn’t cheap).

They covered Iran.
They covered by month.
They have an explorer option that covers SCUBA Diving, and a host of other adventure activities, for what I feel is a small addition.
This option also provides accident protection, vehicle rental excess, and even missed flight connections.
They give you the option to include or exclude the U.S (possibly due to high insurance and medical costs).
The couple option was cheaper (albeit marginally).
A good friend gave us a 7% discount coupon code.
It is extendable on the go, and can be easily done online from anywhere in the world.

To conclude, for a 7 month couple explorer insurance package excluding the US, I paid a total of US$1389.56 after a 7% discount. = SG$1927.02.

Vaccinations

Getting vaccinated is like buying insurance, which I then compare to using parking coupons. We always try to save on these things only to realise it's cheap compared to getting caught. Prevention IS better than cure.

Understandably, many of us in Singapore think that we are immune to many viruses considering the number of jabs we get while growing up, but most vaccinations are not lifelong.

Chilling Out on the Couch in the Consultation Room

There are many places you can get immunized, but you should obviously choose a travel clinic. We picked Tan Tock Seng Hospital cause I still had my yellow booklet from when I took my jabs before my grad trip in Indochina in 2009, and they were open on a Saturday. We were there early at 0900hrs, and though we did not make a prior appointment, they could still proceed even without doctors in on a Saturday. This, we realised, was a better option as we could save on a doctor’s consultation, which is only required if we need prescriptive meds. But they made sure to ask, as some were obviously more comfortable having a doctor around.

After going through with our nurse on the various countries we were visiting, and her explaining all the various viruses we could contract, we settled on: 5 jabs for me and 3 for Leann plus an oral vaccination. Here’s a quick explanation on them.

THE ONES WE TOOK -

Tetanus

Tetanus is a dangerous nerve ailment caused by the toxin of a common bacterium, Clostridium tetani. The tetanus bacteria lives in soil contaminated with animal and human faeces. The bacteria can enter human bodies through a cut or wound on the skin.

It causes muscle stiffness in the neck and jaw (lockjaw), which later progresses to other parts of the body. Death can result from severe breathing or heart abnormalities.

Although it's included in our childhood immunization programmes, a booster is needed every 10 years.

Typhoid

Typhoid fever is a serious disease spread by contaminated food and water. Symptoms of typhoid include lasting high fevers, weakness, stomach pains, headache, and loss of appetite. Some patients have constipation, and some have a rash. Internal bleeding and death can occur but are rare.

It is common in most parts of the world except in industrialized regions. Travelers to Asia, Africa, and Latin America are especially at risk, and apparently, the highest risk for typhoid is in South Asia.

A typhoid vaccine can last you around 3 years.

Yellow Fever

Yellow fever is a disease caused by a virus that is spread through mosquito bites. Symptoms take 3–6 days to develop and include fever, chills, headache, backache, and muscle aches. About 15% of people who get yellow fever develop serious illness that can lead to bleeding, shock, organ failure, and sometimes death.

Travelers to certain parts of South America and Africa are at risk for yellow fever. We needed a yellow fever vaccination certificate in order to obtain Bolivia visa. A single dose of the yellow fever vaccine will protect against yellow fever for at least 10 years.

Hepatitis A

Hepatitis A is a serious liver disease caused by the Hepatitis A virus. Symptoms include yellowing of skin and sclera (white of the eye), dark urine, lethargy and abdominal pain.

It spreads by close contact with individuals infected with the virus or by eating food or drinking water contaminated with the virus. Studies have shown that the longer a traveller stays in a place, the more likely he is to slip up on being vigilant about eating only in hygienic places. That makes him more likely to fall victim to hepatitis A infection.

The vaccination consists of 2 doses which are given 6 months apart. I did my first dose in 2009 but didn’t do my 2nd, but the nurse said it was ok to just take the second dose now for lasting immunity.

Polio

I am going to assume that everyone knows what polio is about. This highly contagious virus can be transmitted by contact with secretions from the nose, mouth or faeces of an infected person. It can also spread through direct contact with an infected person.

The vaccination is taken orally under the tongue and can last you for life.

Influenza

Duh. 1 year $18 bucks, especially useful if you are travelling and staying in a cold climate for a long period of time.

THE ONES WE DIDN'T -

Hepatitis B

Hepatitis B is a contagious virus that is transmitted through blood, blood products, and other body fluids (such as semen). Some people who get Hepatitis B develop lifelong (chronic) Hepatitis B. This can cause people to die early from liver disease and liver cancer.

Our Reason: We are already immunized.

Rabies

Rabies is a deadly disease caused by a virus that is spread in the saliva of infected animals. All mammals can get rabies. People usually get rabies from licks, bites, or scratches from infected dogs and other animals such as bats, foxes, raccoons, and mongooses.

Rabies affects the central nervous system, ultimately causing brain disease and death. Once symptoms of rabies appear, the disease is nearly always fatal, so prevention is especially important.

Our Reason: the risk is more for those who work with or are often in contact with animals. It requires 3 jabs over a month is very costly and lasts only about a year. Even the nurse said that we do not really need it if we are not exposed. So, answer is, we will stay away from animals.

Japanese Encephalitis

Yet another mosquito borne disease that can lead to serious brain infections. Of those who survive, 20%–30% suffer permanent intellectual, behavioural or neurological problems such as paralysis, recurrent seizures or the inability to speak.

Our Reason: It's extremely expensive and needs 2 jabs over 6 weeks and only lasts about a year. As this only affects certain parts of Myanmar which is at the end of our trip, plus we obviously don’t have the enough time for the jabs, we skipped this.

THE PILLS -

Malaria

Based on yesterday, a malaria vaccine is still in the making (http://www.popsci.com/worlds-first-malaria-vaccine-receives-positive-reviews-europe), so those huge pills and uncomfortably tasting pills will continue to make their rounds. All 3 types of malaria pills are explained here, and doxycycline is the one that’s cheapest and accessible at least for me (Note: Army).

Diamox

High altitude sickness pills that work well with some, and not with others (I had a bad experience with it on EBC). This requires a doctor’s prescription, so we couldn’t get it, but there are always friends who have it. And its quite easily available in those high altitude places anyway.

Our Experience

There were very few people in the clinic as it was still early and we had our consultation in a standard doctor’s room. So we mentioned that we had a good long chat (because we were going to many countries), and that we had quite a few jabs required (lucky we weren’t heading to Africa). Our nurse was very professional and thorough: she explained all the viruses and effects and roughs costs to us like a textbook, and also gave us an open date option for the jabs we were unsure of so that we could skip the consultation and thus the queue. After explaining the details, and the administrative part of filling forms and pre-filling our yellow booklets, we were ushered to the treatment room, where she herself administered the vaccines. After a quick prep, I was first. Our nurse explained which jabs on which arm, tells us which jab is next, tells us to relax, and done. The whole process for a total of 8 jabs and 1 oral polio vaccination took less than 5 minutes. Smooth delivery: needle in, vaccine in, needle out, next. It could not be any better than this.

Total bill? SG$587 for us both, of which the yellow fever was $188 each already. Money well spent I say!

Location Clinic 4B, Level 4, TTSH Medical Centre Opening hours Monday to Friday: 8.00am - 5.30pm (Last walk-in appointment at 5:00pm.) Saturday: 8.00am - 12.30pm (Last walk-in appointment at 12:00pm.) Sunday & Public Holiday: Closed