Should You Buy Pet Insurance?

Here's a piece from Money Central that discusses the issue of pet insurance and whether or not pet owners need it. The summary of their thoughts:

I still believe most people are better off forgoing the policies and instead putting the money they would spend on premiums into a savings account. Pet insurance can cost $2,000 to $6,000 over the life of an average pet, and the chances are slim you'd ever have to shell out that much for treatments.

But if you're the type of person who would do anything to save your pet, including spend thousands of dollars on medical treatments, pet insurance might be a preferable alternative to going into debt.

Having written a ton on the cost of pets, I can tell you for sure that there are a lot of people out there that would spend whatever necessary to save their pets. So why does something that can cost $2k to $6k still make sense even for these people. Here's why:

What's changed in recent years is the state of veterinary science, as well as the economics of running a veterinary practice. Vets today can offer treatments that were unheard of just a few years ago -- and at prices that could make you howl. Consider:

• Treatments once reserved for humans, from radiation therapy to kidney transplants, are currently available for pets. That means once-fatal conditions are now treatable at costs ranging from $1,000 to $5,000 or more.

• Vets have access to increasingly sophisticated and costly diagnostic tools such as MRIs. Such screenings not only boost the cost of exams but often detect problems that once would have gone unnoticed, and untreated.

• These expensive tools and procedures have helped create health-care inflation in the pet doctor world.

Oh yeah. Now the same issues that have driven up human medical care costs are impacting the costs of animal health care.

The piece goes on to detail the traps to watch out for when buying pet insurance as well as give some advice on when to buy and when not to. For further information on the subject, you can also see my post titled How to Choose the Right Pet Health Insurance.

I'm not sure I could justify spending $2,000 to save a pet, but for those of you who would spend this (and many who would spend a lot more!), pet insurance is certainly something you should investigate.

Comments

[Marshall Middle]

We have pet insurance for our boxer and seems to pay for itself. We use VPI and get it for a discount through work. I don't really know if it's worth it or not, but as with any insurance you are paying to feel secure.

[Lord]

Generally, pet insurance means spending more rather than less because the people that buy it are those that use it.

[Randy]

I doubt that the insurance companies offer pet insurance at a loss. Any increase in the availability of expensive procedures is going to be offset by an hefty increase in premiums or a hefty increase in the exclusions of the policy.