A British tourist who was stuck in Greece on a ventilator with a £59,000 hospital and air ambulance bill after a holiday insurance mistake has died.
Alan Kirby, 67, was enjoying a family trip to Zante when he suffered a ‘septic’ shock and was diagnosed with pneumonia and suspected lung cancer and received care in Athens.
He had initially thought the pain in his side at dinner was from throwing his stepdaughter’s children around in the sea.
But when he woke up breathless he sought medical advice, and doctors advised he return to the UK for a biopsy on a mass in his lung they feared might be cancer.
Before they could get home, his health deteriorated and he was put on a ventilator – prohibiting him from taking a commercial flight back to the UK – and he was airlifted to a private hospital in Athens.
Mr Kirby thought he had insurance cover for his family but the policy was declared void because he did not tell insurers about a pre existing benign lung condition.
Hospital officials had called his insurance company who disclosed Mr Kirby was aware of the mass – something he says British doctors deemed to be a benign fatty tissue, and told him not to worry about.
This made it a pre-existing medical condition, which he had not declared to insurers, invalidating his cover and landing the family with a £14,000 bill.
Alan Kirby, 67, was enjoying a family trip to Zante when he suffered a ‘septic’ shock and was diagnosed with pneumonia and suspected lung cancer and received care in Athens. Pictured: Mr Kirby with his partner Helen Whitemore,
Before they could get home, his health deteriorated and he was put on a ventilator – prohibiting him from taking a commercial flight back to the UK – and he was airlifted to a private hospital in Athens
Mr Kirby thought he had insurance cover for his family but the policy was declared void because he did not tell insurers about a pre existing benign lung condition. Pictured: Mr Kirby with his stepchild Liza Whitemore
He was left on a ventilator in a hospital covered by his Global Health Insurance Card, and was too unwell to fly home on a conventional flight, but was without insurance to cover a £45,000 private medical flight back home to Yeovil in Somerset.
His devastated family had been raising money to cover the ambulance flight home, and speaking out to make others aware of holiday insurance errors.
The family are now planning to use the donated funds to fly to Athens for Mr Kirby’s cremation.
In a post on his GoFundMe site, his step daughter Liza Whitemore, 40, posted: ‘We would like to thank all your support and donations over the last eight weeks.
‘It comes with great sadness that Alan gained his wings in the night in Athens we will be heading out to Athens to have a cremation.’
Mr Kirby, a car valet, was told he had a chest infection and suspected cancer after becoming unwell on Sunday, July 6.
After his transfer to a hospital in Athens he was placed in a medically-induced coma which he never woke up from earlier this month.
His family had raised £9500 in hopes of being able to fly him back to the UK, but sadly did not reach the target goal before his passing.
His stepdaughter, a private care assistant from Wincanton, Somerset, said Mr Kirby will be having a cremation in Athens this Saturday with family and friends invited to the local pub for a ‘live link’ up.
She had said previously: ‘We know we’ve made the mistake [with the insurance] – that’s the problem.
‘My mum had gone into the bank that she had insurance with and they said, ‘just go on holiday, you don’t have to do anything’. They didn’t know about the mass.
‘And he was well before – he was working as a car valeter the day before the holiday.
‘We’re just desperate to get him home.’
Mr Kirby was three days into his holiday with his partner Helen Whitemore, 62, and Liza Whitemore and her three daughters, when he fell ill on July 5.
Mr Kirby was three days into his holiday with his partner Helen Whitemore, 62, and Liza Whitemore and her three daughters, when he fell ill on July 5. Pictured: Mr Kirby with his partner and grandchildren
He looked ‘dreadful, grey and pale’ during a family dinner in Tsilivi, so went back to the hotel.
‘At dinner he had aching pain all down the right side of his torso,’ said Liza Whitemore.
‘He thought it was from throwing my kids while playing in the sea earlier in the day.’
He woke up breathless and went to a local clinic in the morning, and after extensive testing was sent to a local hospital.
The couple say they thought he had a chest infection and needed antibiotics.
‘But the doctor, who must have had the clinic’s test results, said, ‘antibiotics won’t cure cancer’,’ said Liza.
‘Everyone was petrified, nobody knew what was going on.
‘After five hours, they told my mum she needed to go back to England for a biopsy, because they couldn’t tell from the X-ray if Alan had cancer.’
The hospital had spotted a mass in Mr Kirby’s right lung, which he was already aware of, but says British doctors had told him was a benign fatty tissue mass in December 2024.
Liza Whitemore added: ‘The insurance didn’t know about it.’Two days later Alan was ‘fitting’ in his hospital bed, disoriented and dehydrated with oxygen levels of only 36%.
‘They put him on a non-invasive ventilator and there was talk that night of putting him in a coma but then they said he might not come round because of his lungs.’
The insurance company agreed to fly Mr Kirby to a private hospital in Athens via a helicopter ambulance.
He couldn’t fly to the UK because it was too long a flight and he needed to remain on a ventilator.
But when Mr Kirby arrived in Athens, the insurance company contacted Liza Whitemore to say they were checking his pre-existing conditions.
The checks took five days and the insurance company requested Mr Kirby’s UK GP records – and discovered his ‘pre-existing condition’, the mass in his lung.
The insurance company then told Mr Kirby’s family they will pay for Alan’s care up until the checks began – five days of private hospital care costing £14,000.
He was moved to Athens’ General Hospital where his care was covered by his GHIC card.
The family had wanted to raise £45,000 appeal to bring him home via air ambulance.
This article was originally published by a www.dailymail.co.uk . Read the Original article here. .