Health

Daman policies expire with visas

The insurance company warns tourists they will not be covered for emergency treatment after their visit visas expire.

Mitya Underwood

August 05, 2008

The UAE's leading health insurance company is warning tourists they will not be covered for emergency treatment after their visit visas expire. Daman, the national health insurance firm, has issued new guidelines to tie in with the overhaul of the visa system, which came into force last week. Visitors must now show proof of health insurance to obtain any of the 16 types of visas to gain entry into the UAE, including tourist visas.

Daman has introduced several insurance plans catering to those on 30-, 60- or 90-day visas, but is emphasising that all policies will expire when the visa does. The insurance packages cost Dh40, Dh70 and Dh90 respectively. "The new visitors' plan has been specifically designed to provide emergency in-patient healthcare insurance for any visitor, which facilitates the visa process as well as the visitor's stay in the UAE," said Dr Michael Bitzer, Daman's chief executive.

The insurance is available through travel agencies and includes 100 per cent coverage for a shared room as well as fees for consultants, surgeons and anaesthetists, pharmaceuticals during hospital stay and post-trauma dental treatment. Benefits such as inpatient emergency medical care up to Dh100,000 (US$27,224) are also available. The plan takes in a network of 33 hospitals and clinics. Exclusions to the policies include treatment sought outside the healthcare network for conditions including dental, maternal or optical work, mental health illnesses, patient treatment supplies and all pre-existing and chronic medical conditions.

Daman defines emergency as "the acute onset of a medical or surgical condition manifested by acute symptoms of sufficient severity, including pain, that the absence of immediate treatment... could reasonably be expected to result in placing the patient's health or bodily functions in serious jeopardy." @Email:munderwood@thenational.ae

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Blockchain is a form of distributed ledger technology, a digital system in which data is recorded across multiple places at the same time. Unlike traditional databases, DLTs have no central administrator or centralised data storage. They are transparent because the data is visible and, because they are automatically replicated and impossible to be tampered with, they are secure.

The main difference between blockchain and other forms of DLT is the way data is stored as ‘blocks’ – new transactions are added to the existing ‘chain’ of past transactions, hence the name ‘blockchain’. It is impossible to delete or modify information on the chain due to the replication of blocks across various locations.

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