This cover will give you peace of mind

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Manish from Meerut has been upset for the past several months. His son’s mental health condition suddenly deteriorated.  He had to be taken to a private hospital in Delhi. Manish’s troubles didn’t end there. His was treated in a private hospital and the bill was in lakhs. Manish was sure that he had an active health insurance policy of 10 lakh rupees. But, to his disappointment, he didn’t get any cover as his insurance company did not cover mental illness. Manish paid the bill but now he is under debt.

On this front, the insurance regulator IRDA has now announced a big relief. If you are going to take or have taken a health insurance policy, then, mental illnesses will also be covered under it. IRDA has directed insurance companies to include mental illness under the health insurance policies. This rule will be applicable to all health insurance companies. So, while taking a policy, you must also see whether mental illnesses have been covered in it or not.

Even though people do not take mental illness seriously, it is a huge problem in India.  Challenges caused by the Covid-19 pandemic has made this problem even more serious.  Data from the National Mental Health Survey of India paints a frightening picture. A FY16 study by the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences shows about 15% of adults suffering from one or more type of mental illnesses. They are in dire need of treatment. After Covid-19, the situation has worsened. Irda’s new move will provide relief to thousands of people like Manish. In fact, so far only a few selected companies were giving coverage on mental illness. Going by the figures, in more than 70 per cent cases, insurance companies were not covering mental illness. Now IRDA has taken measures to bridge this gap.

However, there is still a lot to do on this front. For example, companies will give coverage only when the patient is admitted to the hospital, while, treatment of many mental illnesses do not need hospitalisation. Even if the treatment costs several lakhs, hospitalisation is not required. Apart from this, insurance companies put a sub-limit on treatment of such diseases. For example, in a health insurance of 10 lakh rupees, it is possible that the insurer has put a sublimit of 50 thousand rupees towards coverage for treatment of mental illness. Another major challenge is to get admitted to the hospital for the treatment of such diseases. A large part of India’s population either does not consider them a disease or does not consider it necessary to treat mental illness. This is true not only in villages but also in cities.