OREANDA-NEWS. September 07, 2009. The eight-year boy insured with ROSNO under the travellers’ insurance policy was knocked down by a car in Turkey. As a result of the sustained injuries, the child needed serious medical aid, to which end all insurance coverage was spent, reported the press-centre of ROSNO.

The victim’s family found itself in a difficult condition, since they needed to find funds to pay for the costly transfer of the boy to Russia with a specially equipped medical aircraft and with an onboard escort of resuscitators. Following its principles of corporate social responsibility, whereas one of the principles is to help child victims of traffic accidents, ROSNO has charitably assumed additional costs of 35 thousand US dollars by arranging the boy’s return to Russia, escorted by medics. The aggregate amount paid by ROSNO to cover medical and medico-transportation costs in this particular case amounted to 50,000 US dollars.

The traffic accident occurred in Alanya, Turkey. The boy, insured with ROSNO under the standard travellers’ insurance policy and accompanied in Turkey by his grandmother, was knocked down by a car when crossing a street on his way from the hotel to the beach.

The child sustained severe injuries to his head and other parts of the body and was taken by ambulance to the nearest medical institution — State Hospital of Alanya. As soon as the tour operator notified ROSNO about the accident, the authorized doctors representing ROSNO’s assistance partner in Turkey were sent to the hospital. The victim was promptly transferred to a private hospital for further examination and treatment. On the same day, on the basis of medical indications, the child was placed into intensive care and connected to the artificial pulmonary ventilation system. Throughout the week, the injured boy’s condition made his transportation impossible; the child was in a coma. During this period, he was attended by his grandmother, and later by father. Despite the active support of the insurance company’s assistance centre, including the attempts to optimize the costs of medical treatment, the contractual insurance coverage limit of 15 thousand US dollars was completely exhausted.

On 27 August, the hospital doctor permitted to transfer the patient with a specially equipped medical aircraft and with an onboard escort of resuscitators. IC ROSNO decided to assume these costs. The victim was transported to Moscow and placed into intensive care in the Burdenko Children’s State Hospital. According to medics, the child will require a long-term rehabilitation course of up to several months.

"Turkey is one of the most popular foreign tourism destinations for the Russians. In 2008, according to the statistics, this country was visited by over 1.8 million of our citizens, whereof 1.5 million people had been insured with ROSNO, and the number of insured accidents settled by our company exceeded 36 thousand. At the same time, Turkey still ranks first by quantity of accidents. And since the issue of sufficiency of insurance coverage provided by standard policies purchased by our tourists is not regulated by law, we would like to once again urge tourists to pay more attention to the insurance coverage acquired for the duration of vacations abroad. The minimum insurance coverage is not always sufficient to arrange medical treatment, and our charitable spending is, unfortunately, limited. It makes sense to ensure in advance that an extended coverage is acquired, such as the one contemplated by the travellers’ insurance program ROSNO-Voyager. Also, tourists may get additional protection by purchasing accident and sickness insurance policies. This is especially relevant if you leave for vacations with children and elderly", notes Ms. Svetlana Schwab, head of ROSNO’s Travellers’ Insurance Department.