AMID THE spin of recent weeks one fact seems to have been lost in relation to Ireland's health insurance market. That fact is the year-on-year growth in the numbers of people with health insurance in Ireland, writes JIM DOWDALL
Recent unsubstantiated speculation that 200,000 people will leave the health insurance market does not seem sustainable. Leaving aside the figures and numbers published by the market competitors, statistics published recently by the Health Insurance Authority (HIA) show that year on year to March 2009, an additional 32,000 people have joined the health insurance market in this country.
That is despite the unforeseen and massively challenging deterioration in our economy over the same 12 months.
A total of 2,286,000 people have chosen to purchase private health insurance. With the spectre of further cutbacks in Government spending, the health of the health insurance market and the facilities it funds are of significant importance to all stakeholders.
Liam Sloyan, the chief executive of the HIA, has described the market as “very resilient”. While there was a quarterly drop of 13,000 people or just 0.57 per cent in the numbers with health insurance in the first three months of this year compared to the last three months of 2008, there has still been an annual increase in the numbers.
This marginal drop in the first quarter of 2009 includes people who may have left Ireland as well as those who decided to cancel their policy for financial or employment circumstances. And consider for a moment those economic circumstances. An additional 173,000 people were unemployed in March 2009 when compared with March 2008.
It has also been estimated that as many as 100,000 non- nationals left Ireland during 2008. Yet despite this radical change in our economic and demographic landscape, more consumers are now opting for affordable private health insurance.
The health and vibrancy of our health insurance market has not been lost on the international healthcare and finance community who continue to invest in Ireland’s healthcare facilities.
Despite the credit crunch and lack of finance for investment in so many areas, investment in private healthcare facilities here has continued to grow.
Many world-renowned healthcare providers, organisations like the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) which just this week took a majority stake in Beacon Medical Group, are seeking to invest many hundreds of millions of euro in the provision of more world class healthcare facilities in Ireland.
It is important to note that between 1986 and 2004 there were no new private healthcare facilities. That situation has changed dramatically since then with new facilities across the country and this can only be good for consumers.
It is obvious that the investors in these facilities expect a return on their investment. It is equally true that they can only achieve that return by delivering what consumers want – value for money, peace of mind and the highest quality healthcare that meets the needs of consumers, patients and staff.
The Republic, with a population of just 4.42 million, has almost 2.3 million private health insurance subscribers. More than half the population chooses health insurance and the faster access it provides to high- quality medical treatment.
While anyone can gaze into a crystal ball and come up with a version of the future, an objective and rational analysis of the facts show that Ireland’s private health insurance market is undeniably healthy.
If you are reading this article in your office, in your car or on the bus, look around you and consider that more than one in two people in your immediate vicinity has private health insurance.
This is marginally less than the number who had it at the end of 2008 but is still a lot more than the number who had it at the start of 2008.
Scare mongering about significant numbers of people exiting the private health insurance market and entering the public system, or about older consumers having to pay more for health insurance in a community-rated market, serves no good purpose.
Such scare mongering is inaccurate and is unfair to consumers who are already dealing with the economic uncertainties of post-Celtic Tiger Ireland.
Instead of running from cover, consumers are continuing to run for cover.
This fact is not hyperbole from a private health insurer; it is a fact that stands up to the scrutiny of year-on-year analysis of the health insurance market as published by the HIA.
- Jim Dowdall is managing director of Hibernian Aviva Health