7 reasons why you must have a personal health insurance...

(The author is the Founder and CEO of Money Avenues, a Wealth Management firm based in Chennai. Feedback can be sent to mailfpc@ yahoo.com)

Seven reasons why you must have a personal health insurance cover:

Planning for future health care costs is very vital for an overall financial plan. In all the estimates, health care costs are going to be a lion's share in one's finances in the days ahead. There are many reasons for this; Our changing lifestyles, medical innovations to name a few. And these days with the advancement of medical technologies, we live longer with the medical support and they don't come cheap. 


Let's see the 7 key reasons why we need to have a personal health insurance:

Retirement blues:

Retirement will be a great financial challenge for the current set of  working class. More so on the medical costs front. And retirement is not very far away as we assume.. We just suddenly retire one fine morning. And we don't have generous employers who would extend health insurance facility post retirement which leaves us to manage on our own. And the real worries on health begin only after 60+ years. It would be prudent to have a personal insurance plan apart from what your company covers now, the reason being they are cheaper when bought in the younger age. If one has to take a health insurance plan @ a later stage, it would be expensive and cumbersome because of the age and health factors. Take a personal health insurance plan NOW...

Career Transitions:

We keep changing our companies and places of work, unlike our previous generation where many of them worked for government organizations for their entire career. But it's different in our cases and we keep changing our work places and cities.. Which leaves very little scope to concentrate on our personal financial planning issues. Health cover is one which is normally ignored. Imagine if one is changing the company of work, the transition might take few weeks to few months time. And during that time frame, one is left with no health insurance cover for the self and the family. It's not often that one joins the next organization the very next day of quitting the previous organization. In such situations, our personal health cover can only come in handy. 

Career changes:

Our generation does not work in a conventional career environment. Firstly we don't we don't work till our age 60 or so... Secondly we pursue our own dreams and passions in our career. Effectively we pretire and pursue our other ambitions. Gone are the days of conventional career. Such an environment requires a personal health insurance cover @ all times.

Health care costs are sky rocketing:

Consider this:


If one has to spend Rs 5 lacs now towards medical expenses, can you guess what would the same medical expense cost after 15 years on a very conservative estimate?


It could cost upwards of Rs 40 lacs an eight fold increase and this is just a modest estimate.Advancement of medical technologies are the way forward. Such innovations will make people live even longer than ever before. And such medical technologies don't come cheap. Yes organizations do cover the health costs of the employees, but only to an extent of the company's policy.  But such a cover is not possible post retirement. Its better to have an additional cover for the family on a personal capacity to handle such sky rocketing costs. 

Shrinking organizational support:

The health care support extended by the employers may come in for reviews in the future owing to rising costs for the companies. This may lead to tweaking or trimming the existing covers (like exclusion of diseases to be covered, size of cover, parental cover etc.,) which may not be an actual advantage to the employees. To avoid such scenarios, it's better to have a personal health insurance cover.


http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/personal-finance/insurance/insurance-news/companies-resort-to-belt-tightening-exercises-trim-employee-health-benefits/articleshow/11704453.cms 




It's cheaper today than tomorrow:

For eg., an average adult aged 30 years, for an medical insurance cover of 5 lacs will now pay a sum of Rs 7100 Per annum. For the same cover, a 50 year old person will now pay Rs 15,900 PA. It's more than double and that's the difference of taking it early in the life. And taking a health cover at later years will come with lot more expensive owing to health and age reasons. So buy it now...




Tax Saving under Section 80 D:

While calculating one's taxable income, the premium paid for a health insurance policy can be deducted from the total income under Section 80D of the Income Tax Act, 1961. This deduction is over and above the amount under Section 80C which is Rs 1 lac. The amount of deduction available is up to Rs 15,000 of premium. A further deduction of Rs 15,000 can be claimed for the premiums paid for parents and if they are senior citizens, the claim can be for Rs 20,000. 


(The author is the Founder and CEO of Money Avenues, a Wealth Management firm based in Chennai. Feedback can be sent to mailfpc@ yahoo.com)

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Jimmy Rollins: Chase Utlley Will Never Be the Same

Wow - a mind-blowing article from Jayson Stark at ESPN today, wherein he quoted Jimmy Rollins extensively on his take on the injuries/health of Ryan Howard and Chase Utley. Here is what JRoll said about Chase Utley (Click Here to read what JRoll said about Ryan Howard):

A Moment Once Common, Now Rare

For the second straight spring training, Rollins has gone through an entire camp without playing with his double-play partner of the past 7½ years. And while Manuel portrays Utley's absence this spring as a matter of just "saving bullets," Rollins is concerned about the reason for saving those bullets in the first place.

"It's really the same thing as last year," Rollins says. "[Utley's knee trouble] is just one of those things where the more you use it, the more it's going to nag you. And like last year, trying to plant and turn a double play is going to really give him problems. And going to his right and trying to throw back to first -- going to get that ball and not having any legs to throw, he's probably not going to try to make that play anymore.

In His Prime - He Was the Man

"So I think his [injury] is more of a long-term thing. It's like the opposite of Ryan. Ryan's is more of a shorter-term type of injury. You heal it. It gets fixed. And after a while, you have the confidence you're not hurt. With something like Chase, you've got your degenerative hip and the knee that's on the same side, and they're all related.

"You've got [a muscle] that runs from the hip to the inside of the knee and it's putting all types of different pressures on it. So you shave the hipbone down, but the muscle length is still the same. And the muscles treat the body like it's … normal. Regardless of what the hipbone says, the muscle hasn't changed. So that's something that's not going to change."

JAG Comment:  JRoll knows.  Chase was Hall of Fame bound, but he has been derailed, and even his legendary work ethic, toughness and tenacity cannot overcome his condition.  Chase, just keep giving it all you got, there are still great days ahead, just fewer and farther between is all...

It is no wonder, given the circumstances surrounding Ryan Howard and Chase Utley (oh, and did I mention that Placido Polanco is coming off hernia surgery and hasn't been healthy since he returned to the Phils), that the Phils are currently searching for infield help.

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Jimmy Rollins: Ryan Howard May Be Out For the Year

Praying for the Big Fella

Wow - a mind-blowing article from Jayson Stark at ESPN today, wherein he quoted Jimmy Rollins extensively on his take on the injuries/health of Ryan Howard and Chase Utley.  Here is what JRoll said about Ryan Howard (Click Here to read what JRoll said about Chase):

"I don't know what to think, honestly," Rollins says. "If you ask me, with this infection, I don't know if he's going to play this year, because after all the work that he's done, now he's got to hit the reset button."

Get Well Soon, Rhyno

Like most of us, Rollins didn't graduate from medical school during the offseason. But he's had enough leg issues of his own lately to believe he has a good feel for how Howard's issues will affect him over the months to come.

"I mean, the leg is naturally going to atrophy if it's in a boot all this time and you're not getting the full use out of it," Rollins says. "So he's built up strength, but it's not like he was 100 percent [before]. Now he needs to take a step back, and he's probably back down to the 25 to 40 percent range. …

"And it's a tough injury," Rollins goes on. "It's not like he's 150 pounds. He's a big man. And that's a very important part of his game, being able to be on his legs. He doesn't use his legs for speed like me. He uses his legs for power. So if he doesn't have any [strength in his] legs, all that power just goes away."

We should note that the Phillies disagree with this take and continue to put as happy a face on Howard's prognosis as possible. Amaro even says a return sometime in May is "still possible." But Dr. Rollins isn't so sure.

"Oh, he's definitely out for two months. I can pretty much guarantee you that," Rollins says. "And probably nothing before the All-Star break, unless it's like Albert Pujols' fracture [which magically healed itself in two weeks last summer]."

Somewhere out there beyond the horizon, Rollins predicts, Howard will be OK. But he still thinks his buddy faces a longer haul than almost anyone has suggested.

"You can come back from this injury," Rollins says. "There's no doubt. But I don't think you come back at the rate and have the success and the strength in your leg and the confidence that it won't happen again.

"Over the long term, [he'll] … be fine," Rollins says. "But that's where 'long term' is meaning, like, a year and a half. That's when he'll do something and he'll say, 'You know what? That didn't bother me.' And that's when you know you're fine, and you can go out there every single day and not have to worry about it."

JAG's Comment:  Players know these things, and JRoll has always been a candid and reliable source of information.  This is just very bad news.  No wonder the Phils are currently looking for infield help....

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