Those of us with U.S. citizenship can pick up the newspaper on any given day and are almost guaranteed to find at least one story about the significant percentage of our country’s population who can’t afford health insurance coverage.  Those ugly statistics are likely to become even more hideous as unemployment numbers continue their upward march.

With mortgage disasters, credit freezes, down-in-the-dirt consumer confidence and increased joblessness as we meander through recession, it seems like a flat-out stupid time to even think about buying health insurance for our dogs and cats, right?  It sure seemed that way to me.

Remember that seen from the Frank Capra movie, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town?  Just in case you’re not a big 1930s film buff, there’s a scene were a poor farmer crashes a ooh-la-la party hosted by the film’s protagonist.  The farmer chastises the host, saying, “I just wanted to see what a man looked like that could spend thousands of dollars on a party when people around him were hungry!”

There’s something about pet insurance that feels the same way to many of us…  ”I just want to see what a man looked like that could spend money on pet insurance when his neighbors don’t have health coverage!”  Or something like that.

If you can get over any guilt you might have about being better off than some other people, pet insurance isn’t quite that offensive.  It can actually make sense.

Liz Pulliam Westin at MSN’s Money page once thought pet insurance was a complete waste of time.  She seems to have changed her tune.  Although she still thinks most folks would be better off saving the money they’d spend on premiums, she also notest that pet medical expenses are increasing as new techniques and procedures are making their way into the veterinary world.  She concludes:

But if you’re the type of person who would do anything to save your pet, including spend thousands of dollars on medical care, pet insurance might be a preferable alternative to going into debt.

The U.S. seems to be a little behind the curve when it comes to taking out health parties on behalf of Snowball and Fido.  According to one source, over 12% of British pets have insurance, while less than 1% of U.S. pets are covered.  When you consider the love many people have for their animals, that’s pretty shocking.  

But don’t assume that the Brits have it all right.  Although pet health insurance can keep a person who may not have a nest egg set aside to pay for a cat’s emergency room bill from running up a massive Visa bill, health insurance for the furries isn’t always a great deal.  If you thought Blue Cross and Blue Shield was reluctant to pay out, imagine how excited an outfit that insures dogs is going to be to cut checks to cover Mr. Fuzzybottom’s cancer treatment bill.  You’re gonna have a co-pay and a deductible.  There will be policy limits.  It might be for a cute littze fuzzy buddy, but it’s still insurance.

What’s the bottom line?  Should you be purchasing insurance for your health?  There are worse ways to spend your money, but for most people it probably will make more sense to develop a savings account created exclusively for the purpose of handling pet medical expenses.  In other cases, however, having a good policy can be a huge benefit.  I recommend reading these conversations for a little extra input on the topic.

In other words, it’s not as crazy as it might sound.  Depending upon the policy, your pet and your financial condition, you might want to invest in some insurance.  At the very least you can’t dismiss the idea as utter silliness.