If you had to predict the holiday hot spots for 2007 I bet the likes of Libya and Albania wouldnÂ’t be high on your list.But travel insurer Europ Assistance believes these two countries, alongside Morocco, Dubai and India are the places where more of us will be holidaying next year. The insurer has seen changes in the insurance needs of customers and has been developing a medical network in these countries to help people if they fall ill or have an accident.
Rob Upton, marketing manager of Europ Assistance, said: “A number of low-cost carriers are already beginning to open up services to Morocco, so we expect a significant increase in travel there at the latter part of 2006 and early in 2007.
“In addition, Albania will open up in June, once British Airways starts its service to Tirana and on the long haul front, Dubai is increasingly popular and Libya looks set to follow in 2007.”
Europ Assistance spend a great deal of time on researching parts of the world to make clinical assessments of facilities, checking the availability of ambulance flights and planning for big events, for example this year’s World Cup. “In Albania medical treatment is very basic and repatriation costs will be high, as no scheduled airline operating out of there offers stretcher facilities,” Rob Upton said. “So we would need to charter an air taxi to fly home a stretcher patient.”
“We are also seeing a new type of customer, the adventurous elderly traveller, with even people in their 80s heading for remote long-haul locations.
“We applaud their spirit but, of course, it sets us a whole new challenge, yet another reason why we must always stay one step ahead.”