Vegetarians Given Life Insurance Incentive

Summary
An interesting new insurance product has been introduced by Animal Friends Insurance. The insurance plan offers discounted premiums to vegetarians, based on evidence that they are at a lower risk than their carnivorous counterparts of developing certain health conditions. It remains to be seen whether other insurance organisations will follow the policy introduced by AFI .

A none profit insurance firm has launched a scheme which offers vegetarians and fish-eaters a reduced cost cheap life cover .

The offer, considered to be the 1st of its type, is being pioneered by Animal Friends Insurance (AFI). The business is offering vegetarians a seven per cent cheaper premiumon life assurance premiums
The firm said that vegetarians ought to pay less for the insurance, which pays out if the client dies, because they were more unlikely to suffer from a list of chronic illnesses, including some cancers.

Amanda Jude, AFI’s senior director, said that the risk of vegetarians being diagnosed with certain cancers is lowered by up to forty two per cent and the danger of them suffering from heart disease is reduced by up to 30%, but despite this they have, until now, had to pay broadly the same premiums as people who eat meat.
She says that AFI think that this is unfair and says the life organisations should acknowledge the fact that being a vegetarian can impose a very positive impact on life expectancy and cut its monthly charges accordingly.

A standard price policy is also on the market for non-vegetarians. Both insurance plans are sold by LV=, which was previously known as Liverpool Victoria.

In common with standard life policies, a range of things contribute to the cost of the premiums including whether the applicant smokes, their age, weight and sex.

Just at the moment, Animal Friends Insurance is carrying the 7% lower price itself from the money it gets from LV=. In the future, however, the company’s aim was to offer lower costs on specialist insurance plans. In making the discount the business is hoping to sign up enough vegetarians to make it viable for LV= to underwrite yet another insurance policy that takes the vegetarian’s diet into account.

Indeed there are worthwhile savings to be had, a 40-year-oldnon-smoker purchasing £300,000 worth of insurance cover might potentially save £393.60 over a twenty five year term.

Where online life insurance is concerned, AFI thinks that life insurance companies should try to treat those that like meat and those that do not eat meat in a way that is similar to the way they approach those that smoke and those that don’t. Hopefully others in the insurance industry will do the same.

Some senior executivesin the insurance industry are dismissive that there is robust proof that veggies live longer, and how any life insurer would know that applicants who had applied stating that they are veggies did not sometimes enjoy the odd lamb chop.

When it comes to smoking, the insurance company can refer to your Doctor’s records - if you do smoke it’s possible that your GP is likely to be aware. But this isn’t the case when it comes to eating meat, an insurance executive observed.

But some veggies contend that they are not worried about people falling off the vegetarian ways and suggested that once a veggie has become a vegetarian, they don’t regress to meat-eating, unlike smokers who tend to drift in and out of their habit.