Chennai:
In 20 days,between July 10-July 31,450,000 individuals were covered by the health insurers with their standardised health cover `Corona Kavach Policy' and narly 70,000 Covid-related claims worth Rs 700 crore were settled by insurance companies, the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (Irdai),said Subhash C Khuntia, Chairman, Irdai. .
The number of covid -19 insurance claims have already exceeded 1 lakh.
In his inaugural address on Friday at the CII, Southern Region Health Insurance Conclave,Khuntia asked companies to look at more standard products which would create trust in the minds of policy-holders and reduce disputes related to claim settlements.
He said that the current pandemic will lead to a change in health insurance.
“Standardisation products are key and India has taken a huge leap by bringing standard products. IRDAI came out with guidelines for the covid-19 standard benefit-based and the covid-19 standard indemnity health policies.All life, general and standalone health insurance companies have been encouraged to offer the benefit-based policy, while all health and general insurance companies are mandated to offer the indemnity policy," Khuntia said.
Khuntia explained that that the availability of multiple health insurance products often confuses the public and they don’t have enough time to choose the right product. He said that in times of a pandemic,a standardised product would be very useful and would create trust in the minds of policy-holders and result in fewer disputes during claim settlements.
The state-wise data shows Maharashtra, with the maximum recorded cases in the country, has the maximum claims coming in at 44,050 amounting to Rs 571 crore, followed by Tamil Nadu at 12,379, Delhi at 10,175, Gujarat at 7,622, and Karnataka at 6,923.