Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. this week said it would offer life insurance to women with certain types of early stage breast cancer at the same rates as healthy women, reflecting increased coverage for individuals with medical conditions that would have been roadblocks to insurance several years ago. To make such policies feasible, insurers are looking beyond mortality tables to clinical medical underwriting, which takes into account medical advances. The demand for "impaired risk insurance" is expected to increase as baby boomers age and medical advances turn once-deadly conditions into chronic illnesses. "Most people are insurable," said Matt McAvony, president of Target Insurance Services in Overland Park, Kan., and chair-elect of the National Association of Independent Life Brokerage Agencies. "Most people can get an offer to buy insurance." Hartford said its new coverage is available to women who have been treated for the first time for "small, well-differentiated, localized Stage 1 breast cancer and have a strong prognosis for survival based on the results of common tests." Hartford estimates that 100,000 women who were treated during the last five years for breast cancer meet the guidelines for its new insurance, representing about 15% of the women diagnosed with stage-one breast cancer. "We see it as an affirmation of the progress made in the clinical area," said Ann Hoven, chief medical director for the Hartford, Conn., company's Individual Life Division. She said that Hartford routinely monitors clinical research about serious illnesses, and since 1991, deaths from breast cancer have dropped 20% because of early detection and improved treatment. After conducting its own research Hartford decided it could offer this new insurance, which would significantly decrease the cost of life insurance for a woman. For example, a 50 year-old woman who had been treated for stage-one breast cancer previously would have had to pay $1,500 over a year plus an additional $2,500 annually for five years. Now, women who meet the new underwriting guidelines would pay only $1,545 a year. An estimated 5% to 10% of the insurance-buying population has a medical condition that may make their insurance priced beyond standard. That number likely will grow as baby boomers age and medical advances enable patients to live long lives despite a serious medical condition. "I'm insuring people today who had prostate cancer six years ago, people who years ago, we wouldn't have touched," said Jack Fischer, who owns Amsterdam Financial, an independent financial-services firm in Chicago. The firm specializes in securing insurance for impaired risk cases. "We have more knowledge, more comparisons, more statistics, more years have gone by with positive results," said Mr. Fischer. U.S. Financial Life Insurance Co. in Cincinnati sells only impaired risk insurance and has grown annually since it was established 15 years ago. It provides coverage for individuals with, among other things, cancer, heart disease and diabetes. U.S. Financial takes a multipronged approached when evaluating potential policyholders and considers whether a person is living a healthy lifestyle and following a doctor's orders. The company, a subsidiary of AXA Financial Inc., sells the policies through life-insurance agents rather than directly to the public. "I think many people believe they can't get life insurance is because of a medical condition, and that was true years ago, but not today," said Hartford's Ms. Hoven, who compared the new insurance with changes that occurred about a decade ago for patients with a history of heart attacks. Mr. Fischer encouraged people with medical conditions to find agents who are knowledgeable about impaired-risk Insurance. "You really want someone who has done it and understands it before they write you up," he said. For more information about Amsterdam Financial LLC, call (312) 440-0600 or visit www.AmsterdamFinancial.com Published: The Wall Street Journal, October 7th, 2005
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Jilian Mincer, DOW Jones Newswires