Mandatory cover? ‘Yes, but not now’ — Zokufa

Abstract

Making medical scheme member contributions mandatory is less important than properly regulating prescribed minimum benefits (PMBs) which pose the biggest, most imminent threat to medical schemes’ viability, Board of Healthcare Funders (BHF) CEO Dr Humphrey Zokufa claims.
He was responding to findings which Barry Childs, CEO of Lighthouse Actuarial Consulting and CareGuage presented at the BHF conference in the Drakensberg in July showing that the medical aid industry loses R13.5 billion annually due to anti-selection pressures when cover is not mandatory. Childs compared open and restricted schemes for well over a decade and found open schemes reversed from being 12% cheaper in the 1990s to being 14% more expensive in ensuing years, rising to 30% more expensive between 2000 and 2012.