A LOCAL insurance provider has noted a concerning rise in payouts to people below the age of 50 needing medical attention correlating to non-communicable diseases (NCDs).
Out of its $58.6 million total insurance payouts in 2017, BSP Life — a leading life and health insurance company — paid out a total of $10.5m covering overseas evacuations, local hospitalisation, specialists care and general outpatient services to its customers.
The medical payouts had increased to $10m in 2017 compared with $8m paid out in 2016 and $6.3m in 2015, an average growth of $4.2m over the past three years.
Revealing these statistics yesterday, BSP Life managing director Malakai Naiyaga said this was a concerning trend, particularly for the majority of medical payouts in the age group 31 to 40 years.
He said some of the cost increase was attributed to the rising cost of medical treatment overseas, BSP health's increasing number of insureds and the increased need for medical attention because of NCDs.
The top four most frequent medical conditions requiring overseas evacuation included cancers, orthopaedics and replacements, eye treatments and heart-related conditions.
"We are also seeing a very concerning rise for people needing hospitalisation, specialists care and overseas evacuation below the age of 50 which directly correlates to the rise in non-communicable diseases," Mr Naiyaga said.
Mr Naiyaga said NCD also impacted their death payouts results, where the highest number of death payouts was for the age group 50 to 54 years or 23 per cent of the total claims received.
When the age bracket was expanded to include 40 to 54, the percentage of payouts was 46 per cent — almost half of the total death claims payouts.