Health Insurance Lifetime community loading - objective view of health insurance from a financial point of view

6k is diddly squat when it comes to paying for medical bills if you do require hospitalisation, added to the fact that consultants/hospitals as mentioned do not always take on self paying customers due to the fact that the bill can rise substantially in the case of any complications and how do they recoup their money? They don't want the hassle of it.

Allowing for the 5 yr pre existing thing you would be pushing it getting it later if you need anything at all that is not an emergency and can get you into the public system.

Totally get why someone might not have health insurance as it is a big cost but it would be one of my first priorities out of any discretionery spends I might have. I was lucky most of my life in that my employer provided it, seldom used it thankfully but did have a few claims over the years.

Also, it means you can be proactive about your health. For example, if you've got insurance, it's a lot easier to get a mole checked out at an early stage and get peace of mind, rather than putting it off until it turns into a serious situation. With quite a few "non serious" conditions, sometimes nipping it in the bud and getting on the right treatment path early can actually prevent or slow down a worse longer term situation. And if you don't have health insurance, it's a lot more tempting to just keep putting it off.

OK I don't think I will get anyone to agree with me here, but then the health insurance forum is always likely to be heavily weighted towards those who recommend it. Points taken though.
Although I do still think 45yrs is plenty early to start cover. I have saved €6600 over the past decade. So take away the €1000 loading for the next 10 years and I'm still up €5600.

Well, yes, but at the the cost of being exposed to a risk which, happily for you, did not eventuate. Had you got sick in that time you would not be up €5,600; depending on how sick you got you could be quite seriously down.

Have you worked out how much money you have lost by insuring your house against fire for the past ten years, and it didn't burn down in any of them?

The point here is that insurance isn't a purely financial matter. If you insure against a risk that doesn't eventuate, the premium you paid isn't a dead loss. You had the benefit of being covered against the risk, which provided reassurance, relieved stress, etc.

Not having health insurance when you're young and healthy (and have nobody financially dependent on you) may be a rational choice, but it does depend on personal preference and values, so what's rational for you may not be rational for me, and vice versa. You may be somebody who, if they do get sick, will be stoical about it; will take what comes calmly; will not resent the loss of time, loss of capacity or loss of earnings; will not feel guilty about how your sickness affects others close to you; will take comfort in the consolations of philosophy; etc, etc. Or, you may be somebody who will bitterly resent every day spent on a waiting list; every minute spent in a waiting room; every opportunity or occasion that you can't avail of; etc, etc. Preferences like that will feed into your decision about whether to effect health insurance or not.

jaykay said:

OK I don't think I will get anyone to agree with me here, but then the health insurance forum is always likely to be heavily weighted towards those who recommend it.

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Askaboutmoney is a general personal finance forum and nobody here has any vested interest in whether or not you take out health insurance. People generally respond to posts/queries on their own merits. But in many cases, possibly including your own, where one can afford it, it's often prudent to take out private health insurance. And there is a huge variety of plans on offer from several insurers from the very basic/cheap to the very expansive/expensive offering something that caters to most people's needs.