Health and critical illness insurance provides peace of mind

THE high cost of critical healthcare services is seldom truly understood until an individual is faced with a health crisis.

It is for this reason that Sagicor is encouraging all Barbadians, especially self-employed individuals, to first take the appropriate actions for living a healthy life to prevent the onset of non-communicable diseases (NCDs). The company also recommends that in those cases where there is a need to address a serious medical need, to consider the options available that would provide peace of mind for themselves and their families.

“Barbadians have had the fortunate experience of being supported by a strong, public healthcare system, which has provided subsidised, relatively high-quality healthcare for many years, to multiple generations. This is unlike the experience for those living in several other countries across the globe, where the responsibility of healthcare falls on the individual or family,” said Paul Inniss, Executive Vice President and General Manager of Sagicor Life Inc.

As a result, Sagicor states that it is only when Barbadians are put in a position where they or someone in their family requires urgent and critical healthcare treatment for the purpose of combating issues such as life-threatening NCDs or terminal illnesses, that they truly get a sense of the cost of these procedures, the necessary ongoing treatment and rehabilitation.

“For those with medical coverage or critical illness policies in place, whether arranged through their employer or on their own, timely access to these services is much easier and more accessible as the protection provided by the insurance provision underwrites or ‘covers’ a major portion of the financial costs. However, for individuals without insurance, this typically means a complete reliance on the free, public healthcare system and the availability of resources, these being medical personnel, equipment and supplies,” said Inniss.

What this means is that those with insurance are in a position to explore more options for treatment, including services provided by private healthcare facilities, whereas those without insurance would be forced to find the cash/credit to pay for said services, or stick to the free public health system.

Inniss explained that this is by no means an indictment on the public healthcare system, which Sagicor agrees is one of the strongest and most reliable in the Caribbean and even across the globe. However, he added, the Government itself has emphasised on several occasions that the system is under tremendous pressure to provide the full range of services necessary to provide treatment and care for every single Barbadian, in every medical case that presents itself.

“Therefore, for an individual providing for their family through self-employment, the impact of not making adequate financial provisions could be crippling, either from the perspective of the impact on their savings, or the inability to access said healthcare services due to a lack of financing, which would in turn threaten their long-term health and their ability to provide for their family,” Inniss explained. (PR/AS)