Help with Health Insurance for Newborn due this month?

[steveoneal]

We'd be grateful if anyone can help us understand how and where to get health insurance for a newborn - ideally from birth, or as soon after as possible.

For coverage from birth we imagine one of us might need to get coverage, and then the newborn would be covered - so that would be fine.

It seems individual coverage for a newborn would have some sort of delay.

Mom is Thai married to Dad who is a foreigner.

Thank you in advance for your help.

[Satcommlee]

You might have problems unless the parents were already insured by the same company for at least 10 months prior to the birth.

The youngest you may insure the child could be from 14 days up to 3 months.

I went through the same thing - ended up having to wait till my son was 3 months old before getting a policy to cover the family.

[krisb]

Did you not try google?

Type in Thai health insurance and there's over 11million hits.

[steveoneal]

Yes, thank you - tried Google. The challenge is finding a specific plan that covers from birth (not 15 or 30 or 60 days later). Most likely this will have to be a plan that one of the parents get for coverage to be extended to the newborn at birth. We were hoping someone may know which insurance companies might offer this.

[kurnell]

I insured both my kids since birth, firstly with LMG then Alliance. I recommend you don't opt for OPD as you never make enough visits to justify the additional expense. If you have to see the doctor at Samitivej for example you just ask the doctor for the name of the medication and buy it over the counter (a generic version) and you save a fortune. Eg. I bought a local anti-biotic for 1/5 of the rate that Samitivej was selling it for at my local chemist.

[steveoneal]

Kurnell, thank you for these insights.

Did you as a parent, or family, have prior coverage with LMG and then call them to add the newborn?

Or were you able to get coverage for the newborn itself right from birth?

[kurnell]

Kurnell, thank you for these insights.

Did you as a parent, or family, have prior coverage with LMG and then call them to add the newborn?

Or were you able to get coverage for the newborn itself right from birth?

Yes, we just added them to the list as they popped out. You already have insurance of course?

[David48]

May I ask the Parent why the rush for insurance?

My Thai partner and I had Twins earlier this year.

We have no insurance ... no plan to have any.

So curious ... why the rush?

[steveoneal]

Kunell, yes we have comprehensive insurance in the US and then the terrific GeoBlue travel insurance which covers everything except the birth process itself. But as we may be here for for a while we need to replace GeoBlue - ideally getting coverage from birth of a new baby. May you keep adding to your list as long as you wish!

David48 - congrats on the twins (we have twin toddlers. I appreciate you putting the question out there of why insurance in the first place. The basic concern is a worse case scenario should a serious medical condition occur. Would Mom's Thai coverage be sufficient? We don't need or want VIP treatment, and are suspicious of high end hospitals with low volume and fancy rooms, but we are concerned we could get the care we wanted in an extreme case otherwise.