Medicare and Travel

Does Medicare cover me outside the United States?

Almost never. "The United States" for Medicare purposes means the 50 states, Washington D.C., Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, and the Northern Mariana Islands. Step outside that list, and Original Medicare generally will not pay.

There are exactly three exceptions:

• You are traveling without unreasonable delay on a direct route through Canada between Alaska and another U.S. state, and a medical emergency happens while you are in Canada.
• A medical emergency happens while you are in the U.S., and the closest hospital able to treat you happens to be in Canada or Mexico.
• You are on a cruise ship and the ship is within 6 hours of a U.S. port when you get care.

Outside of these three situations, Original Medicare does not pay for care anywhere outside the U.S.

Mexico: what San Antonio-area residents need to know

A lot of people in our service area travel to Mexico regularly, visit family, or spend part of the year there. Ordinary travel to Mexico is not covered by Medicare. The only Mexico-related exception is the narrow case above: a medical emergency that starts in the U.S. where the nearest capable hospital happens to be across the border. A vacation, a visit, or an extended stay in Mexico is not that situation.

If you spend meaningful time in Mexico, plan on a separate travel medical insurance policy for that time. These are typically short-term policies purchased specifically to cover emergency care abroad, and they are not the same thing as Medicare or a Medigap plan. A licensed agent can point you toward options when you are getting ready to travel.

What about a Medicare Advantage plan?

Some Medicare Advantage plans add a supplemental worldwide emergency and urgent care benefit, often with a dollar cap on how much it pays. This is a plan-specific extra benefit, not something every Medicare Advantage plan includes, and the details vary a great deal from plan to plan. Check your own plan's Summary of Benefits, or ask us to check it for you, before you assume you are covered while traveling.

Within the U.S., a Medicare Advantage plan generally ties you to its own network, so even domestic travel can mean a different cost-sharing picture than staying home, separate from the outside-the-U.S. question entirely.

What about Medicare Supplement (Medigap)?

Several Medigap plans (Plans C, D, F, G, M, and N) include a foreign travel emergency benefit: generally 80% of billed charges after a $250 annual deductible, up to a $50,000 lifetime maximum, for emergency care that starts within the first 60 days of a trip. It does not cover medical evacuation, repatriation, or routine non-emergency care abroad.

Plans C and F are closed to anyone who became Medicare-eligible on or after January 1, 2020, if you already have one of those plans you can keep it, but a new shopper cannot buy one. See the full Medicare Supplement guide for how these plans work overall.

Traveling within the United States

Original Medicare has no network, so it covers you the same way anywhere in the U.S., whether you are visiting another Texas county, flying to see grandchildren in another state, or wintering somewhere warm within the country. A Medicare Advantage plan is different, since it generally ties you to a network built around where you live, so check your plan before an extended trip even within the U.S.

Before you travel

Three things are worth doing before any trip, especially one outside the U.S.: confirm exactly what your specific plan covers by reading its Summary of Benefits, price out a short-term travel medical policy if you will be outside the U.S. for any real stretch of time, and carry your Medicare card and any plan information with you. See our Medicare Advantage and Medicare Supplement guides for how each type of coverage works overall.