Insurance cancer can wreck you financially

Cancer is the No1 cause of unnat¬ural death among Thais. Nine peo¬ple die from the disease every hour, many of them as a result of what and how much they eat.

The National Cancer Institute forecasts that this year one Thai will fall ill with cancer every four minutes, against one every seven minutes in 2006.

The cost of treating critical ill¬nesses rises every day. The current medical cost has risen by 10 to 15 per cent from last year.

For example, the medical cost for treating a cancer patient is between Bt800,000 and Bt4 million, while heart surgery is in the range of Bt400,000 to Bt1.2 million. The medical cost for serious kidney dis¬ease is at least Bt600,000, while that for a stroke is about Bt500,000.

These figures exclude costs such as hospital room, food, medicine, service and doctors' charges.

The high treatment costs mean that many people have to shoulder huge debts to undergo treatment. Many insurers have, therefore, intro¬duced special policies or rider pack¬ages to cover critical illness, includ¬ing cancer.

The advantages of these special policies are that they are generally easy to understand and policyhold¬ers can claim back all the costs rele¬vant to medical treatment.

But the key condition is that, if you want to buy this special policy from any insurer, you first need to purchase their main insurance poli¬cy. No insurer will allow you to buy a rider unless you have its main policy.

However, applicants do not need to have a medical check before buy¬ing this kind of policy, unless the total coverage exceeds a certain amount - often Bt2 million.

The premium prices for those aged 30 are generally just Bt9 to Bt23 per day, or Bt3,285 to Bt8,396 per year. Premiums are more costly for older policyholders.

Although the cost of premiums generally rises every year at most companies, some insurers such as Bangkok Insurance fix the premiums for cancer insurance at the level you first buy the policy or rider. The downside, though, is that its premi¬ums are relatively high.

Keeping prices as low as possible is clearly important for all companies amid high inflation and reduced con¬sumer purchasing power. Overall premium payments for all types of insurance in Thailand have dropped to an average of Bt20,000 per per¬son per year from last year's Bt30,000.

American International Assurance (AIA) has recently intro¬duced a package to cover cancer and 44 other critical illnesses. Lifetime coverage entails 20 years of pay¬ments.

The minimum coverage is Bt300,000, with a maximum of Bt3 million. The Bt3million coverage comprises minimum coverage of Bt300,000, another Bt200,000 in the event of finding advanced cancer, Bt300,000 for death from cancer and compensation of Bt5,000 per day up to a maximum of 500 days.

ING Life Insurance also offers a "Simple Package Plan", a policy that covers 41 critical illnesses. Its life¬time coverage period requires 20 years of payments. The initial cover¬age is Bt150,000, with maximum overage of Bt1.2 million. The Bt1.2 million consists of Bt150,000 mini¬mum coverage, Bt150,000 health insurance, Bt450,000 accident insurance and Bt450,000 criticalillness insurance.

The maximum coverage for daily medical treatment is Bt2,000 for up to 365 days. The plan is targeted at those earning Bt30,000 to Bt50,000 a month and who are looking for an easytounderstand policy.

Muang Thai Life Insurance has a "Muang Thai Happy Healthy" proj¬ect that provides similar coverage for 30 critical diseases.

The project contains three pack¬ages: the Smart Package for general workers, the Lady Package and the Executive Package for higherpaid businessmen. The lifetime coverage period offers initial coverage of Bt50,000, with additional cover for accident insurance, health insurance and daily medical treatment.

Meanwhile, Ayudhya Allianz CP Life (AACP) has pioneered insurance cover for cancer. The premium for females aged 31 to 35 is Bt20 per day, or Bt7,300 a year. Policybuyers do not need a medical checkup. However, the coverage is only for can¬cer treatment and not for death from the disease.

AACP has three coverage plans, at Bt500,000, Bt750,000 and Bt1 mil¬lion. If preadvanced cancer is found, the coverage will be 10 per cent of the total. Once cancer advances, policy¬holders will get total coverage with daily treatment compensation of Bt3,000 per day for up to 500 days. However, there is a condition that policyholders must not be found to have any cancer within 60 days of the policy being activated.

However, specific cancer cover of this sort can be expensive if policy¬holders do not claim all the coverage. There are also several limitations in the coverage conditions. AACP has, therefore, recently introduced a new policy called "May Plan 25/25".

This provides minimum coverage of Bt50,000. The coverage for preadvanced cancer is Bt50,000, with another Bt500,000 for advanced cancer. There is also lifeinsurance cover for 100 per cent of the mini¬mum coverage. At the end of the 25th year, a policyholder will get Bt105,000 as a return.

To summarise the position for females aged 30, AIA's premium for cancer is Bt15 a day, while ING Life Insurance's premium is Bt23. Muang Thai Life Insurance's daily premium is Bt14, while AACP's is Bt9.