@neil I have both a GHIC and an EHIC!

@neil your travel insurance will expect you to use it if you are in EU hospital. Might not cover the difference.

@neil Yes. Got one last time I travelled to Germany (to replace a lost EHIC.)

I have used the EHIC in the past to claim free healthcare for my child and it's very very useful indeed.

@neil Worth saying that your travel insurance in Europe will likely not be valid (or at least make any claim very hard) if you don't have a GHIC or EHIC (although I suspect the last EHICs have now expired given their 5 year lifteime? Not sure).

@neil Yes, although I forgot to bring it with me on the first overseas trip I made after applying - which I believe can make things more difficult than not having one at all (luckily it was not needed).

The prominent Union Jack on the card should also mean that I can prove that I'm British to skeptics, but somehow everyone already seems to know 🤔

@neil I have both the GHIC, and the EHIC.

@neil i don't have a passport (that's either current or in my current name) so it'd seem to be redundant... of course, this may change, depending on how the next 3 years pan out

@neil Yes, I got one before going to FOSDEM this year

@neil I thought that my GHIC had expired but having just tried to apply for a new one apparently not. "We've already sent you one" was the response.
I've no idea where I've put it though.

@neil @mewsleah could still be useful in Ireland, which you do not need a passport to travel to as a Brit

@flangey @neil i don't have any photo ID, and i'm pretty sure you need something to get to Ireland

@neil if you have a medical condition which travel insurance refuses to cover, the GHIC means it may be possible to travel to the EEA when you'd otherwise be stuck in the UK.

I'm glad we managed to keep that after Brexit.

@neil When I got them in 2024, I first got a GHIC, believing it covered a superset of the countries covered by the EHIC. Then I read more closely and realised that it didn't (at the time) cover the EEA, so I had to get an EHIC as well.