Saturday, December 12, 2009

Understanding the health insurance industry



When people talk about insurance policy, one of the paramount questions that takes center stage is how to get an affordable health insurance policy.

The disturbing aspect of this thing is fact that professional financial managers also ask the same question as though it is complicated. Everyone has the right to understand what the health insurance industry are yapping about and also how to buy an affordable health insurance that is in harmony with each individuals budget. In order to better understand health insurance, we may have to to take a pipe into the history of health insurance to find out how it all began.

Health insurance began as an idea in 1694 by Hugh Chamberlain in the US as " Accident Insurance" and it was formally offered first by Franklin Health Assurance Company, Massachusetts, a firm founded in 1850 as Insurance against:

  • Injuries arising from railroad accident
  • Injuries associated with steamboat accident
However, the inclusion of illness as coverage area of Health insurance commenced in 1890.



Health Insurance: Health insurance is a form of insurance that bears the financial implication in part or as a whole of policy holders medical expenses. This medical conditions may include all forms of accident that cause partial or complete disability, prolong illness, etc.

When a health insurance agent is attempting to sell its product without explaining the following terms:
  • mortality
  • expenses
  • and investment
 or how the insurance industry portrays health insurance as a scheme without any form of investment or profit makes it even more complicated.
We need to understand that health insurance is a form of investment that benefits both the policy holder and the custodian-the health insurance industry. The Health insurance industry achieves this purpose by equitably transferring the expenses from one entity to another since everyone does not fall sick at the same time and even when they fall sick, their medical expenses are not the same, so Health insurance industry can cope with this.


When individuals are equipped with this knowledge they are able to make informed decision on how to get an affordable health insurance product by comparing costs and benefits of all policy sold by Health insurance company, their terms and conditions before signing the health insurance contract

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