Many UK citizens face a high risk of developing critical illnesses, several studies have shown.
Recent estimates from Cancer Research UK, for instance, indicate that for people born after 1960, half of men and 45% of women are at risk of developing at least one form of cancer in their lifetimes.
The 2015 study conducted by the London-based independent charity group also revealed that males were more likely to be diagnosed with prostate cancer while females faced a higher risk of getting breast cancer. Lung, bowel, and kidney cancer rounded up the top five list of cancer types with the highest lifetime risk estimates among Brits, according to the research.
New data gathered by the British Heart Foundation (BHF), meanwhile, has shown that strokes hit more than 100,000 people in the UK each year, a figure that is equivalent to one incident every five minutes. The illness is also the single biggest cause of severe disability in the country, with about a quarter of cases happening to working-age citizens.
While not all severe medical conditions are fatal, surviving one often entails significant financial turmoil. This is where critical illness insurance comes into play. This supplementary insurance product gives policyholders financial cushion should they get seriously ill and need time off to recover.
Critical illness cover pays out a tax-free lump sum should the policyholder be diagnosed with one of the medical conditions listed in their policy document. Most insurance companies also require claimants to meet a certain level of severity for an illness and survival period – usually between 10 and 30 days – which are detailed in the product disclosure statement (PDS), before providing coverage.
Policyholders can often choose from several types of critical illness coverage, according to the independent personal finance website Money to the Masses. These include:
Among the core conditions critical illness insurance typically covers are heart attack, cancer, and stroke, which are also the leading causes of disability in the UK. Most policies also offer coverage for the following medical conditions, provided that policyholders meet certain severity criteria and exhibit specific symptoms:
Policies, however, do not cover medical conditions that were diagnosed before application, even if they were listed in the policy document. Many insurers also exclude hypertension and non-invasive cancer, along with injuries such as broken bones, from coverage. The list of covered illnesses varies between insurance providers, with some offering more coverage than others.
Another key difference between insurance companies is how they define certain illnesses. To standardise how the industry defines different medical conditions, the Association of British Insurers (ABI) has published a guide, which lays out the minimum standards for critical illness that policyholders must meet to make a claim. But because these are only minimum standards, many insurance providers have come up with clearer definitions than those dictated by ABI, giving rise to what is known as ABI+ definitions. Adopting these definitions is now considered to be among the distinguishing characteristics of a good critical illness insurance policy.
Just like other types of insurance policies, several factors impact the cost of critical illness coverage. Independent online broker Anorak grouped these factors into two categories:
Money to the Masses listed several questions that Brits should ask in order to find a critical illness insurance policy that best suits their needs. These are:
To come up with the list of the leading critical illness insurers in the country, Money to the Masses compared the policies from major insurance providers using a range of key metrics, including the number of conditions covered and illnesses that meet ABI+ definitions, policy limits, and claims payout. These are the ones that came on top. The list is arranged is alphabetically. The figures are up to date as of December 2021.
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