You may have done some basic searches for medical insurance abroad and seen some of the larger companies in the US and their outrageous costs for medical insurance abroad. Paying $100 for a certain number of months in advance to get your visa approved can be daunting and very costly. What do those plans even cover? Is it worth it when the country you are going to has low out of pocket costs for sick visits or preventative visits? Don’t get me wrong, medical insurance is very important, especially in case of emergency or hospitalization. But with a slightly higher deductible you can get lower premiums, plus look around and companies offer medical insurance a lot cheaper than the large corporate ones.
To get my working holiday visa I ended up using IMGlobal and I got their “Patriot International” plan. What was great about IMG is that they provided a letter specially for visa purposes that said everything necessary to be counted as medical insurance. Of course it is actually medical insurance, maybe not the best plan including preventative care and such, but good for emergencies and when you really need it.