Paying the premium

My last post was on medicalising everyday life.  This is an issue which keeps coming back to haunt me, and might do forever more because of the medical problems of ageing in our “medically advanced” society.

I spent a couple of hours this morning surfing the net for information about senior’s benefits, organisations, rights etc in Aus, and there is a comprehensive range of sites available offering everything from discounted travel and insurance to online courses to feed the brain.  Seniors certainly aren’t forgotten.  But then I looked into our health insurance and I figure that, as older Aussies, we are being discriminated against. 

I know that insurance is a game of averages, and the “pool” comes from statistically averaged information – age, employment, weight and all the usual cross checks.  However, it doesn’t by any stretch of the imagination take my personal circumstances into account when assessing my premium.  I am not the same as any other 55 year old woman, regardless of how similar we are in height, weight etc.  Yes, I smoke – minimally – but I also exercise daily, both mind and body, I have never been in hospital except for childbirth, my age-related medical issues are all self-managed. 

Last year we took out medical insurance, but we have to question the wisdom of that decision.  In the year 2000 the Australian government, in their wisdom, came up with the Lifetime Health Cover loading.  For us, this means a loading on our premiums this year of 44%.  We could choose not to have medical insurance – as so many others do – and bear the 1% surcharge which would be considerably less than what we pay in premiums, but we realize our cover would not be sufficient as we get older.

So we are caught in a conundrum.  The loading and the surcharge are not explained to people planning on moving here.  Maybe you just need to know what to ask.  I did a Google search for info that NZers moving to Aus might be able to access.  One of the best sites I found was http://movetoaustralia.net/, an info site set up by a couple who moved here and wanted to make the move easier for others.  Even that didn’t have much at all on the LHC loading, possibly because the authors aren’t old so didn’t think of it.  Quite probably if you have medical insurance in NZ before you came here, you would continue it here.   We didn’t.

These days, with the cost of everything skyrocketing and waiting lists getting longer by the day, especially for non-essential surgery, you just can’t afford not to have medical insurance.  My advice – don’t leave it as late as we did, you will certainly regret it when those huge loadings hit your pocket. The Department of Health and Ageing website has comprehensive information – check it out, http://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/health-phi-fact27.htm