If you've searched Google for private health insurance that covers malaria then you are most likely for looking for trusted UK based health insurance providers that can cover your malaria.
Our advice when shopping around for private medical insurance that covers malaria is to speak to a health insurance broker. Health insurance is extremely complex and if you want absolute certainty that malaria is covered by your policy you should talk with a health insurance broker who can explain which policy providers will cover this medical condition and which will not.
There are many advantages to using a insurance broker but the biggest by far is that you're using their expertise at no cost. They are paid by the insurer (Aviva or Bupa etc) rather than by you so it costs you no extra to use their services.
- Do you reside in many different postcodes? Some will give you a cheaper premium than offers. A insurance broker will be able to advise whats best.
- Do you have a hobby that may invalidate your insurance claim? A broker will know this critical information.
- If you are a couple and one of you has claimed on your policy this year would it be cheaper to separate you both onto two different insurance policies?
- You've lean't you're at risk of developing a certain condition and want to know which insurer offers the largest amount of cover for it. A broker will know this instantly saving you huge amounts of time and effort.
You can call around every medical insurance provider you can find and ask if they cover malaria, however this will be a very time consuming process. Each insurer will ask for your medical history because its not normally a simple yes or not if a medical condition is covered or not.
Its far far quicker to speak to one medical insurance broker which will know which policy providers on the market cover malaria and under what conditions they do or don't cover it.
Malaria Information
Malaria is a serious tropical disease spread by mosquitoes. If it isn't diagnosed and treated promptly, it can be fatal.
A single mosquito bite is all it takes for someone to become infected.
It's important to be aware of the symptoms of malaria if you're travelling to areas where there's a high risk of the disease. Symptoms include:
Symptoms usually appear between 7 and 18 days after becoming infected, but in some cases the symptoms may not appear for up to a year, or occasionally even longer.
Read more about the symptoms of malaria
Seek medical help immediately if you develop symptoms of malaria during or after a visit to an area where the disease is found.
You should still seek medical help even if it's several weeks, months or a year after you return from travelling.
If there's a possibility you have malaria, a blood test will be carried out to confirm whether or not you're infected.
You should receive the results of your blood test on the same day. If you have malaria, treatment will be started straight away.
Malaria is caused by a type of parasite known as Plasmodium. There are many different types of Plasmodia parasites, but only five cause malaria in humans.
The Plasmodium parasite is mainly spread by female Anopheles mosquitoes, which mainly bite at dusk and at night. When an infected mosquito bites a human, it passes the parasites into the bloodstream.
Malaria can also be spread through blood transfusions and the sharing of needles, but this is very rare.
Read more about the causes of malaria and how it's spread
Malaria is found in more than 100 countries, mainly in tropical regions of the world, including:
The 2014 World Malaria Report, published by the World Health Organization (WHO), estimates there were 198 million cases of malaria worldwide and 584,000 deaths in 2013.