@Ronald ****

Just less than $100? I paid over $330 Australian for just a month's insurance in June. Travel insurance has become expensive.

@Ron *****************

My Thai mate working in a gas station in Pathum Thani earns the minimum wage. Not a job Thais want to do but 350 a day is what he makes.

@Ron *****************

The minimum wage is 353 baht a day in Bangkok. Don't know how you get B.

@Jon *********

That's not cheap for a developing country.

@Sharron ******

Have you found an insurance company in thailand that will give you cover at your age?

@Richard ********

No problem. Each to their own. Phuket is not a place to which I would choose to return.

@Sharron ******

If you can get health insurance in Thailand it will either cost a small fortune or will have a huge excess e.g. 0 baht and will not cover any known conditions. It's the major factor dissuading me moving permanently to Thailand from Australia.

@Alan *********

So the 0 baht required to be kept in a bank for retirement visa is subject to 20% tax under these 'new laws'?

@Sharron ******

What do you mean by 'keeping your Medicare' here? I am assuming you are referring to Medicare in the States, but what happens if you fall ill in Thailand and are unable to get home?

@Richard ********

I hate Phuket but lived in Nai Harn not Patong. Phuket is expensive, infested witrh Russians and the natural habitat other than the beaches has largely been detroyed for tourism. I suspect you have a reason for living there and after 27 years you are probably nicely set up there. For a relative newcomer looking for somewhere to live out the last years of life, it's not a place I would advise him to move to. In fact out of the three places mentioned, I'd choose Bangkok, but I am sure he could find somewhere much more leisurely and affordable elsewhere in the country. Phuket is also the one place in Thailand in which your own transport is an absolute necessity. At 76, you don't want to be negotiating for a fair price with the local transport mafia.