Canadians carry their national health care coverage with them wherever they go, but unfortunately they don’t carry the Canadian cost of health care with them.

This can make for some costly surprises if they happen to get sick in the U.S., where they must pay the difference between their Canadian coverage and the high cost of health care in the States.

In one recent case, a sniffle in Florida cost a Canadian patient dearly in the U.S. He went to a U.S. health care facility for a cold… what his Canadian doctor would have known to be a common and non-serious complication of a recent chemotherapy treatment. But by the time his brush with the U.S. health care system and its battery of tests was over, the bill was over $100,000.

Almost none of the costly tests that ran up that tab were deemed necessary by the Canadian health system, which meant the patient himself was liable for the difference.

Health care providers in Canada are trained to advise patients about the difference between the cost of health care in Canada and other countries, but the enormous difference between Canadian and U.S. costs present a real financial risk to Canadians who get injured or sick in the U.S. and require immediate treatment.

For the same reason, many U.S. citizens are seeking medical care in countries such as Mexico, Panama, Ecuador, and others where the cost of health care is lower than the States.Canadians carry their national health care coverage with them wherever they go, but unfortunately they don’t carry the Canadian cost of health care with them.