Life Policies Especially For Vegetarians
Summary
An interesting new insurance product has been introduced by Animal Friends Insurance (AFI). The new policy offers lower premiums to vegetarians, based on evidence that they are at a lesser risk than their meat-eating counterparts of developing certain medical conditions. It remains to be seen whether other insurance firms will follow AFI’s lead .
A no-profit insurance business has introducd an insurance policy which offers egg eaters and vegetarians a reduced premium life insurance.
The offer, thought to be the first of its type, is being marketed by Animal Friends Insurance (AFI). The organisation is offering veggies a seven per cent discounton life insurance cover premiums
The firm claimed that veggies ought to pay a lesser cost for the product, which pays out if the client dies, because they were more unlikely to suffer from a list of critical illnesses, including some cancers.
Rebecca Puttey, A senior director at Animal Friends Insurance, said that the danger of vegetarians being diagnosed with certain cancers is reduced by up to 40 per cent and the danger of them suffering from heart disease is reduced by up to thirty per cent, but despite this they have, until now, had to pay identical insurance costs as plan holders who eat meat.
She says that AFI think that this is unfair and says the life organisations should acknowledge the concept that being a vegetarian can make a positive impact on life expectancy and reduce its monthly premiums accordingly.
A normal arrangement is also on the market for meat eaters. Both plans are sold by LV=, which prior, was known as Liverpool Victoria.
In common with standard life insurance policies, a range of aspect contribute to the cost of the plans including whether the applicant smokes, their weight, age and sex.
At the moment, AFI is funding the seven per cent price reduction itself from the fee it gets from LV=. In the future, however, the firm’s objective was to offer lower costs on specialist insurance plans. In the business is hoping to sign up enough vegetarians to make it economically viable for LV= to underwrite another policy that takes the veggie diet into account.
Indeed there are welcome savings to be made, a 42-year-oldnon-smoker purchasing £300,000 worth of life insurance might potentially save £393.60 over a 20-year period.
Where life insurance is concerned, AFI believes that life insurance companies should start to treat those that like meat and those that do not eat meat in approaches matching the way they assess non-smokers and smokers. We hope that that other companies in the insurance industry will do the same.
Some senior executivesin the insurance industry doubt whether there is proof that veggies live longer, and how any life insuranec company could prove that applicants who had stated that they are vegetarian did not enjoy the occasional Big Mac.
When it comes to smoking, it’s true that there are your Doctor’s records – if you now don’t smoke it’s possible that your GP is likely to be aware. However, this is unlikely to apply when it comes to eating meat, an an insurance industry spokesperson observed.
But some veggies contend that they are not worried about people falling off the vegetarian wagon and suggested that once a vegetarian has become a veggie, they do not regress to meat-eating, that is unlike smokers who tend to drift out and back again into their old smoking ways.