Useful Information About Critical Illness Cover in East Asia

Likewise to other countries such as UK, South Africa, etc various causes of critical illness exist in East Asia. In East Asia also, probably most of the critical illness claims come from cancer. Cancer may have made around 77 percent of critical illness claims from men. Meanwhile critical illness conditions such as heart attack and renal failure may have also made some casualties. They may have brought around 7 percent of critical illness claims respectively.

Furthermore, stroke and other critical illness conditions may have produced 4 percent and 5 percent of claims respectively. As for women, around 89 percent may have claimed for a critical illness such as cancer. This rate is much higher than that of men. This could be due to most women suffering from breast cancer. Additionally, women may have also made critical illness claims concerning renal failure, stroke, heart attack and other critical illness conditions. The respective percentages could be represented as follows: 7 percent renal failure, 2 percent stroke, 1 percent heart attack and finally 1 percent other critical illness conditions.

As per Munich Re 2000, it had been noted that accelerated critical illness policies may not be as exposed to critical illness risks than the main plans. Thus, if the critical illness claims data is analysed for the accelerated policies results may not be as accurate if compared with the results obtained from the main policy analysis. Therefore, critical illness claims from accelerated policies may have been lower than that of main policies. Let’s have a look.

Results about critical illness claims for men insured under the main critical illness cover may have been recorded. Around 736 claims out of 935,563 policies may have been made. Concerning women, insured under the same type of policy, nearly 949 critical illness claims over 203,994 policies may have been registered. Meanwhile, for rider policies, about 185 critical illness claims out of 292,806 policies could have been made by men. As for women, about 238 critical illness claims out of 304,644 policies could have been made. Generally, the claim rate for accelerated critical illness policies may be around 0.708 and for main policies the critical illness claims rate may be around 0.915.

In addition to, as per Liu SY, 2000, the amount of critical illness conditions covered in a policy may lead to the success of an insurance company offering critical illness cover. Countries comprising of the East Asian market may now be offering critical illness policies that may be covering up to 36 critical illnesses. Furthermore, more than 50 different illnesses may have been given to consumers as benefit triggers. But in Taiwan, only seven core critical illness conditions may be accepted. These could be demonstrated as follows: cancer, stroke, heart attack, kidney failure, coronary artery bypass surgery, paralysis and major organ transplant. All the other critical illnesses may be offered by most companies in the East Asian market.

The implementation of additional benefits besides original critical illness policies may have rather helped insurers to boost up critical illness cover sales. These benefits may not have been found on the policy documents. These could have been given by the insurers at the time of making an agreement for a particular critical illness cover. Some policies may have also added terminal illness as benefit triggers similar to the UK where Total and Permanent Disability had been added.