My thought is that if I am on tour my emergency contact (my wife) will answer the phone for mumbers from area codes where I am. Also any emergency or medical staff would likely be calling from a number identifying them as such not a blocked or anonymous number. Also they'd likely be fairly persistant and my wife would be more likely to answer when I am away on a tour in case there was some emergency. Depending on how your emergency contact handles email an email might not be read for a day or might wind up in a spam folder and be missed entirely.