Why buying health insurance for senior citizens makes sense

Most of the senior citizens above the age of 60 years are prone to suffer from health issues.  Worse still, the higher the age group beyond 60, the more the likelihood of health issues. Hence, it is absolutely necessary to insure senior citizens with health insurance that provides them adequate protection from all kinds of diseases and ailments that go with old age.

With the ever-rising cost of hospitalisation and medical expenses, senior citizens without medical insurance may well find themselves severely handicapped financially when it comes to treatment of critical illnesses such as cancer, heart attack requiring replacement of heart or bypass surgery, stroke, kidney failure, coma, sclerosis of liver, among others. Senior citizens who do not have medical insurance to protect them from these critical illnesses may have to spend their life’s savings on treatment of these illnesses, or if they do not have anyone to support them financially, they may have to live with these diseases and suffer the consequences.

There are many insurance companies that have medical insurance policies specifically designed to provide medical cover to senior citizens. Some of these policies include Optima Senior from Apollo Munich, Silver Health from Bajaj Allianz, Health Suraksha from HDFC Ergo, Health of Privileged Elders from Oriental Insurance, Senior Citizen’s Red Carpet Health Insurance Policy from Star Health, MediSenior from Tata AIG, among others.

Some of these insurance policies offer entry at any age after 61 years and life-long renewal option and sum assured from Rs 50,000 to as high as Rs 7.50 lakh per annum.