by Susan Hely June 5, 2019, 12:48 pm
Mental health claims through insurance are on the rise.
Up from 5% of total insurance claims over a decade ago, mental health claims have reached 20% or one in five of total and permanent disability insurance claims. They also make up about 18% of income protection (also known as salary continuance) claims.
Mental health conditions are challenging for insurers and can be different to other diseases such as cancer, which can be treated, recovered from and people can return to work. Mental illness can evolve over time with symptoms such anxiety and depression, explains Didier How Yin Fat, pricing actuary for TAL life.
Mental illness is more complicated to diagnose too. Sometimes it is hard for doctors to certify mental illness and find the best way to control it. It can be harder than other diseases to treat, How Yin Fat points out.
Sometimes returning to work can exacerbate mental health problems as it may have contributed to in the first place, explains Richard Land, head of insurance at AustralianSuper, Australia’s largest superannuation fund with more than $145 billion under management.
The growing number of mental health claims does pose challenges to the sustainability of the practices of group insurance, says Land, who together with How Yin Fat presented a research paper on mental health and its impact on group life insurance at the Actuaries Summit this week.
Land says it does put pressure on premium rates. Under the MySuper rules, group insurance is mandated and it can’t be handled by exclusions and declines.
Land says as the Australian economic cycle weakens and slows, it will impact on insurance because people’s financial stress will rise and then lead to more anxiety and mental health issues.
While some personal insurance policies ask for information about pre-existing conditions such as mental illness, big superannuation funds typically offer members automatic cover through group insurance.
And although some insurance companies offer personal insurance using pre-existing conditions, they won’t provide mental illness cover if people have had any form of counselling or if a woman has had postnatal depression.