Impact of Gender and Age on Claim Rates of Dread Disease and Cancer Insurance Policies in Taiwan

Abstract

In this paper, the impact of both gender and age on the claim rates of dread disease and cancer insurance policies were examined using unique data taken from Taiwan's private health insurance policies issued by non-life insurers during the 2012 to 2015 policy years. Those aged 30-39 served as the reference group. For the total number of dread disease policies, male insureds had a higher non-cancer claim probability than female insureds, while an age under 20 was associated with much lower claim rates for dread disease policies than for ages over 50. The claim rate for dread disease policies increased rapidly beginning at age 40 for both cancerous and non-cancerous diseases amongst male insureds. Amongst female insureds, those under 20 had much lower claim rates for dread disease policies. Only those aged 50-59 had a higher claim rate for non-cancerous diseases. For the total number of cancer insurance policies, male insureds had lower claim rates than female insureds, with an upward trend being associated with age. For male (female) insureds aged over 40 (20), the claim rates of cancer increased with age.

Keywords: Taiwan; cancer insurance; claim rate; dread disease insurance; non-life insurance.

Figure 1

Claim rates of different age groups for dread disease and cancer insurance policies by gender (Claim rate = # of claims for each age group/# of insurance policies for each age group). (a) Claim rates of total insureds; (b) claim rates of male insureds; (c) claim rates of female insureds.