Medishield insurance (provided by CPF) stops at age 85. The annual premium payable at age 85 is $1,123. I believe that this is subsidised by the younger members and the true cost should be higher.
So far, the Ministry of Health is unwilling to extend Medishield beyond age 85. If it is extended, the premium is likely to be $1,500 to $2,000 a year for the next 10 years. This is likely to be beyond the budget of the elderly people. When the premium is so high, those who are healthier are likely to stop the insurance. Only those who are in poorer health will continue. The cost could increase more sharply, due to the small pool.
What can the elderly consumers do? Beyond age 85, most people have so much health problem that it may be impossible to fix them. I know of many elderly people who prefer not to go to hospital, and to let their medical conditions be untreated. They know that their time will be up soon - it is called ageing, and that there is very little that can be done by medical science.
If they want to be treated, they can still reduce their cost by going to subsidised wards, and pay from their Medisave account, or from their children's accounts. They can also try to minimise the cost by staying for short periods and only when necessary.
Tan Kin Lian
So far, the Ministry of Health is unwilling to extend Medishield beyond age 85. If it is extended, the premium is likely to be $1,500 to $2,000 a year for the next 10 years. This is likely to be beyond the budget of the elderly people. When the premium is so high, those who are healthier are likely to stop the insurance. Only those who are in poorer health will continue. The cost could increase more sharply, due to the small pool.
What can the elderly consumers do? Beyond age 85, most people have so much health problem that it may be impossible to fix them. I know of many elderly people who prefer not to go to hospital, and to let their medical conditions be untreated. They know that their time will be up soon - it is called ageing, and that there is very little that can be done by medical science.
If they want to be treated, they can still reduce their cost by going to subsidised wards, and pay from their Medisave account, or from their children's accounts. They can also try to minimise the cost by staying for short periods and only when necessary.
Tan Kin Lian
rex comments as follows,
ReplyDeletei am curious at the implications of your statement that the MOH does not want to extend medishield insurance for those above 85 years.
Actually MOH is not an insurance compnay. MOH is an intermediary between the consumer and insurance company in the background. I doubt it very much there is any insurance compnaies willing to offer insurance to an 85 year old man with 95% of his body in the coffin already... High premiums for very old people to be insured is an obvious and sad fact of life.
So i felt that the underlying connotation given in the sentence as quote above, is not very fair one.
rex
Hi Mr TanKL,
ReplyDeleteYou was in the committee for CPF LIFE. You also recommend the scheme in your blog.
Now, the 10 year yield of SG gov bond is below 2%. In future, do you think the CPF LIFE can maintain at 4% around?
I was not in the committee for CPF Life. I think that CPF Life is able to maintain the 4% interest rate, because long term investments (e.g. in global equities) is yielding more than 4%. But the decision is really up to the government - whether to maintain 4% or not.
ReplyDeleteThey should benchmark the interest rate to inflation and not government bonds (which are unusually low during the current time).
Hi Rex,
ReplyDeleteMedishield is run by CPF on behalf of Ministry of Health. The policy decisions on Medishield are made by the Health Minister.
The private shields operated by the insurance companies have the a portion, representing the Medishield component, reinsured back to CPF. It is very complicated, but is quite typical of how things are done in Singapore.
Rex comments as follows,
ReplyDeletethanks for the clarification, i appreciate it.
nevertheless, i think that whoever is running it would still have to grapple with the reality that it is a money losing business to insure 85++ year old customers who are practically more than half dead so i can sympathise with why MOH made the decision...
As for your comment that it is typical of singapore to have complicated rules, this is very true!! The best example is the CPF Life system, you can faint when you go to the website, there are numerous little snippets of explainations here there everywhere but not in a single place in the website!! I analysed the CPF Life Document they just sent to me, as well the website, and i also spoke to CPF officers on 4 different occasions, each time i got a slightly different answer which seemed to make sense at the time i asked. And now after a few weeks i try to review what i "learned" and i found that i still dont understand this CPF Life system..
By the way does Fisca conduct talk on CPF Life, it would be good to listen to third party view instead of listening to a CPF OFficer who has his own constraints when trying to explain the system to us.
rex
During my time at NTUC Income with you, Incomeshield offered lifetime coverage with premium stagnant from age 85 renewable as long as not lapsed or policy benefits claimed across limits. Is it no longer the case now?
ReplyDelete