Critical Illness Cover Claim Statistics And Analysis

Claims by condition

Based on facts and statistics provided by Aviva Insurance on their claims received in 2009. Cancer is by far the highest effecting illness in both men and women with 54% of claims form men and a huge 79% of claims for Women relating to cancer. Whilst heart attack claims for men are at 20% (2% for women) also a significant high percentage. Multiple Sclerosis forms then next highest condition claims have been made for surprisingly above Stroke.

Illness Male Female Cancer 54% 79% Heart Attack 20% 2% Multiple Sclerosis 6% 9% Stroke 8% 5% Heart surgery 6% 1% Benign brain tumour 3% 3% Other 3% 1%

When critical illness cover was first introduced insurers had to include cover for cancer, heart attack and stroke to be able to call their policies 'Critical illness Cover' however these policies have moved on now and include many more types of cover for the more serious life threatening conditions.

Claims by age

Continuing with data from Aviva Insurance 2009 claims, it is surprising to note that the highest level of claims are received from the age group 40-49, and even women age group 30-39 is significantly high.

Age group Male Female Less than 30 2% 4% 30-39 27% 35% 40-49 45% 43% 50-59 24% 17% 60+ 2% 1%

The above research is only based on claims made but take into consideration that cancer is the highest of these and then looking at information from Cancer Research UK where it is stated that there are 298,000 new cases of cancer diagnosed every year in the UK alone (12.7 million cases worldwide). Every two minutes someone in the UK is diagnosed as having cancer in the UK. With Breast, lung, bowel and prostate cancers accounting for more than 50% of new cancers each year. Cancer can develop at any age.

Cancer UK Stats Male Female No. new cases 2007 149,356 148,635 No. deaths 2008 81,712 75,011 5 yr survival rate 56% 43%

Adding further information from British Heart Foundation. Heart and circulatory disease is the UK's biggest killer. With over a third of UK deaths caused by Cardiovascular disease, that's over 193,000 in 2007. Coronary heart disease the main form of Cardiovascular disease caused over 90,000 deaths in a year in the UK. Heart failure is associated with severe disabling Morbidity around one third of people having heart failure, dyspnoea severely limits physical activity, with common day-today tasks such as washing, dressing or walking from room to room the effects breathlessness occur. Over half the people who have had a heart attack die within 28-days and of those who die three quarters die withing the first 24 hour period. So therefore the longer survival post heart attack the best chances of maintaining life. 76% of men aged 40-59 who survive the 28 day period are still alive after five years, and at 10 years 63% were still alive.

You would expect doctors and health professionals would have common access to such information and it shows that these professionals are seeking critical illness cover to protect themselves and their families should the worst happen to them.