The Ministry of Health can chalk up a victory in long bitter battle against the Capital Markets, Insurance and Savings Supervision Department at the Ministry of Finance. A few weeks after Supervisor of Capital Markets, Insurance and Savings Prof. Oded Sarig issued an ultimatum banning changes in health insurance policies in the Economic Arrangements bill, he today issued the draft "Supervisor's Plan - Compensation Coverage for Private Surgery in Israel", in which he bans insurance companies from selling policies to new clients that include compensation, which gives policyholders an incentive to first use government healthcare or health funds' coverage.
The position paper states, "No insurance plan will be approved which includes coverage for private surgery in Israel that will allow a policyholder to choose between indemnification for the costs of surgery by the insurer and financial compensation for surgery carried out by the health funds or the public health system." The order will come into effect in January 2014. The Ministry of Finance will accept comments from the public until August 7.
So far as is known, Sarig's measure contradicts the Capital Markets, Insurance and Savings Supervision Department's position on the matter. Insurance companies and the Insurance Supervision Department say this ban will raise the cost of the surgical component of health policies by an average of 10%. The department also says that the measure will worsen the duplication of insurance policies held by some policyholders.
Sources at the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Health attributed Sarig's decision to pressure applied in the past year, especially after the Minister of Health Yael German's committee began its review of the interface between public and private healthcare. A clear majority of committee members support returning private healthcare to government hospitals, to the joy of Ministry of Finance officials who believe that this will expand the use of private health insurance and the national expenditure on healthcare.
Opponents of private healthcare, both inside and outside the Ministry of Health, believe that the Capital Markets, Insurance and Savings Supervision Division will agree to additional measures to reduce private healthcare because it will be possible to forego the return to private healthcare.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on July 8, 2013
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