I GOT the chance to meet my good-looking and young financial advisor at the bank yesterday.

“Is that you sir?” she asked. “Hello, yes it’s me,” I replied.

“I almost didn’t recognize you sir. You lost weight but it looks good on you. You look younger,” she continued.

I answered: “Oh, thank you. I recently had a painful gout attack that lingered for a month. I didn’t eat well.”

Then she remembered our last meeting when I told her about my hospital confinement in 2021 due to severe Covid 19 with pneumonia.

Until now, she’s amazed how I triumphed over the Delta virus that killed many adults all over the world.

“I’m so glad you made it and recovered sir. Malakas pa talaga kayo. How’s your exercise routine?” she said.

I said, “I’m still on it. Regular exercise like jogging helped me a lot to beat the virus and fully recover. I think it still helps me now to get fit and strong.”

Then I asked her, “Have I told you that the real killer of Covid 19 patients is anxiety during confinement? When an old patient wakes up late at night or early morning, he would find himself alone in a very lonely room feeling very uncertain of his fate.”

I continued, “The first question he would ask himself is that would he live or die in the absence of his family. The second question is whether he survives or not, could he pay the very costly hospital bill?”

And she looked at me as if she wanted to know how I dealt with those questions. Not giving her time to ask, I quickly added, “I guess I was just mentally and emotionally prepared before I entered the hospital. I didn’t have much money but I felt my body can endure the virus.”

True enough, I was already doing sit-ups on the fifth day and push-ups on the sixth day. I was out of the hospital on the 7th day or exactly a week since I got hospitalized.

What about the hospital bill? I didn’t worry about it because I was told PhilHealth was there to help me. Of the more than P500,000 bill charged to me by the hospital, I only paid P70,000 due to PhilHealth benefits and discounts from friendly doctors.

My financial advisor could only smile as she tried to remind me the importance of health insurances which played a major role in assisting many Filipinos hit by Covid 19.

After my confinement, I immediately availed a health insurance from a private company. This coverage and that from PhilHealth could probably make hospitalization even more worry- free.

The pandemic is over. But there’s no telling as to when another virus could bring disaster to our world.

Be prepared. Get insured.

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