5 Points to Consider Before Purchasing a Second Health Insurance Plan in Indian Market

Buying a second health insurance plan is not a trivial task. You need to assess several things before buying an additional plan for a successful health insurance investment.

In this article, InsuranceDekho attempts to help potential insurer buyers choosing a second health insurance policy make an informed decision. Before going in for a second health insurance plan, do consider the existing conditions and future requirements. 

Some of these requirements are as follows:

* Your age and family members to be covered

* Number of family members to be covered under the plan

* Current income

* Entire family members’ medical record, past and current

* Coverage available under the current policy

Policy Coverage 

If your existing plan is falling short of delivering the promised offerings, then it’s time to look for another plan. Sometimes policies cannot meet a family’s medical needs due to some limitations, exclusions or capping features. You should ensure that the second policy acquires no sub-limits, co-payment clauses, or any other hidden limitations or exclusions. This will help avert any type of hurdle during hospitalization.

Top-up Plans

Besides going for a second health insurance policy, you can buy a top-up plan. A top-up plan provides coverage beyond the sum insured in the insurer’s existing plan. It enhances health insurance features and benefits.

A top-up plan can be bought on an existing plan or as a basic policy. You can opt for such plans either from the current insurer or from any other insurer. If you possess an insurance cover offered by your firm, you can pick a top-up policy on the same and can enhance his saving.

So, consider going in for a top-up plan before buying a new health insurance policy.

Critical Illness Riders

A critical illness rider is an optional add-on feature. It enables policyholders to avail a lump sum (Sum Assured) amount in case he/she is diagnosed with critical illnesses mentioned in the policy wording. Thus, it can protect you and your family from any financial crunch that may arise due to some unforeseen critical illnesses.

The best thing is that a critical illness rider is available at a lower premium rate than the premium paid for second health insurance. You can buy it to compliment his existing health insurance. It can protect you and your family from any financial crunch that may arise due to some unforeseen critical illnesses.

So, it is advisable to opt for a critical illness rider instead of going for another policy in certain cases.

Look for portability feature

The portability feature is an option to change health insurance policy from one insurance company to another without losing benefits the insurer has accumulated.

If planning on buying a second health insurance policy just because the services are unsatisfactory, it is advisable to change the insurer. This way you will not lose the benefits of the existing policy.

While availing the portability option, you should opt for a higher sum insured (higher than the sum insured of the current insurer) with extra offerings and benefits such as critical illness cover. So, portability can be an ideal option to upgrade your existing plan and avail more coverage benefits and better service than before. 

Lifelong Renewability

If you have a health insurance policy, which allows the renewability option up to a certain age only, then you must opt for a new plan with lifetime renewability feature. This is beneficial because once you reach the age beyond which you can’t renew your policy, a plan with the lifetime renewability allows you to renew your policy lifetime i.e. without any age restriction.

So, even if you forget to renew your plan before the due date, the grace period (the policy will be renewable provided you pay the premium within 15 days after the expiry date) can give you a chance to renew your plan post the due date without losing its benefits.

Quick, Healthy and Delicious—Cure.Fit’s New Ready-to-Eat Product Range Launched

Ready-to-Eat Products

* The products will be available for online ordering in Bangalore, Hyderabad and Delhi

* They have a shelf life of 12 months and contain no chemical preservatives, artificial additives

or trans fat

India’s leading integrated health and wellness platform, cure.fit, announces the launch of its Ready-to-Eat products under its healthy food delivery vertical—eat.fit. This range of products includes an offering of healthy easy-to-prepare food options that are 100% safe and free of chemicals, highly affordable and most importantly, delicious and authentic in taste.

The Ready-to-Eat products, priced between Rs. 100 to Rs. 150, are available for ordering in Bangalore, Delhi and Hyderabad via the cure.fit app or on Swiggy and Zomato. While currently the two variants being launched are Rajma Masala and Dal Makhani, eat.fit plans to expand its range in the next six to nine months to include around 13 varieties.

In fulfillment of its promise to always maintain a high bar on health, these products are free of chemical preservatives, artificial colours or flavours, and trans fat. The ambient nature of the products coupled with a long shelf life of 12 months make them easy to store and stock as well. Retort technology, which is used to manufacture them, ensures that the ingredients do not lose their freshness.

These products have been manufactured in conjunction with Tasty Bites—one of the pioneers in the ready-to-eat category who have also been credited with launching it in 1987 in India. Our products are being made in their state-of-the-art factory in Pune from where they are shipped to other eat.fit locations and have been developed using their rich expertise and insights coupled with an active feedback seeking mechanism we have with our customers.

Speaking on the launch of this new offering, Ankit Nagori, co-founder, cure.fit, said: “Today convenience is highly prized as people are hard pressed for time. However, it is also important to never compromise on the food we consume. As a consumer-first health brand, eat.fit seeks to constantly develop new offerings that are not only healthy and convenient for our customers but are also packed with flavour. Our Ready-to-Eat products are specifically designed to deliver on this. With this range of food, we hope to gain greater acceptance and household penetration, especially at a time when home-cooking is at the forefront.”

About Cure.fit 

cure.fit Healthcare Pvt Ltd is a holistic integrated healthcare platform headquartered in Bangalore. Founded in 2016 by Mukesh Bansal and Ankit Nagori, cure.fit aims to address preventive healthcare through a combination of engagement, coaching and delivery using a mix of online and offline channels. cure.fit caters to living a healthy life through four critical dimensions- eat.fit, mind.fit, cult.fit and care.fit. While cult.fit focuses on physical strength and fitness, eat.fit focuses on healthy and nutritive food, mind.fit on mental wellbeing and care.fit on integrated medical and lifestyle care.

cure.fit is an app based service provider and is available on Android and iOS.

Meitra Hospital Appoints Dr. P Mohanakrishnan as the New CEO

Dr. P Mohanakrishnan, a health professional with more than 3 decades of experience in healthcare spanning India and the Middle East, joins Meitra Hospital as Chief Executive Officer (CEO).

“Dr. P Mohanakrishnan brings with him a strong   discipline and prowess in establishing and managing hospitals not just in India, but Internationally as well. We look forward to his wealth of experience and are excited to have him lead Meitra & achieve KEF’s vision of transforming Indian Healthcare.”, said Faizal E. Kottikollon; Chairman, Meitra Hospital & Founder Chairman, KEF Holdings.

He has held leadership roles across premier healthcare facilities in Kerala & GCC. Prior to taking up his current position, Dr. P Mohanakrishnan served as the CEO of Avitis Institute of Medical Sciences, Palakkad. He also founded the prestigious Institute of ENT and Head and Neck Surgery in Kerala and established it as one of the premiere institutes specializing in the discipline of ENT in India.

“The healthcare sector across the world has become the nucleus of sustenance. And Kerala with its well-established healthcare networks and infrastructure is perfectly poised to welcome people seeking quality and advance treatments, not just from the rest of India but from across the globe. Meitra Hospital offers world-class tertiary care by blending the concepts of ‘Evidence Based Guidelines’, modern-day technology, notable clinical expertise and unparalleled infrastructure. I am looking forward to establishing the facility as a well-noted centre and preferred destination amongst those seeking superlative care, in line with international standards,” said Dr. P Mohanakrishnan.

How Rarly Child Health Immunization is Important in India?

By Dr Nadeera Nilupamali, Co-Founder and Vice President (Product), ImmunifyMe

India, the largest democracy of the world and highly populated country topping the list in terms of population density recorded nearly 67,385 births in 2020 on New Year's Day. Country, home to the highest number of unvaccinated children, has embarked upon an intensified journey to increase the vaccination coverage with mission Indradanush 2.0.

Vaccines play a key role in defending most vulnerable: Children and infants.  However, one in every five children remains un-immunized in the world. And as a result, over 3 million children die every year due to diseases which can be easily prevented by proper vaccination. Routine childhood vaccines are among the most cost-effective life-saving interventions. Thanks to vaccines, countless cases of disease such as polio, measles, diphtheria, pertussis (whooping cough), rubella, mumps, tetanus, rotavirus and hepatitis etc have been prevented and saved millions of lives.

According to recent data released by the Indian National Statistical Office (NSO) 97% of the children aged between 0-5 years in the rural setting receive at least one vaccine, but, when it comes to those children being fully immunized, the percentage drops to 58%. Urban setting is not better in any way, 98% of the children receive at least one vaccine but only 60% of the children aged between 0-5 years are fully immunized. Many people working in public health have admitted that even this figure seems to be inflated and the situation could be worse on the ground and a large percentage of children dropping out of immunization programs.

Especially in India in recent times, routine vaccination has been intensified with additional efforts to optimize community coverage. Government has started putting extra efforts with the Mission Indradhanush programme which was launched in December 2014, aiming  to ensure 90% of infants would be vaccinated by the year 2020. Furthermore, under Intensified Mission Indradhanush 2.0, which is the second phase of the initiative launched on October 31, 2019, with a plan to cover 271 districts across India where fewer than 70% infants are currently vaccinated.

The success of Government Intervention

Despite the government spending billions of dollars in programs like Mission Indra Dhanush, the country's immunization rate remains one of the lowest in the world. Immunization amongst children here in India is a big challenge and there many factors to it

Access to vaccines

Religious beliefs

Inter-state, Inter-City Migration

Anti-Vaccine mentality and in some cases

Not being aware about the vaccination process at all

Misplaced priorities in parent front

Parents busy lifestyle and forgetfulness

Proper monitoring of vaccination

Management of vaccine coverage data

Real time monitoring of vaccination and lack of digital interventions

Why does immunisation make financial sense for the country?

Healthcare for young children eventually determines the country's  economic productivity , because vaccine-preventable diseases are known to cause stunting in childhood, which can lead to poor growth, poor adult health, and diminished learning capacity of the children. Prevention always costs less than treatment . For an example if a child ends up with any disability from the illness  like paralysis from polio which could have easily prevented by a vaccine, or neurologic problems from encephalitis caused by measles  etc will result in huge costs for the  treatments and also for providing special school services and other requirement for that particular child.

Morbidity, mortality, and the economic cost of treatment for vaccine preventable diseases are undoubtedly  going to add a huge burden to a country's economy.

If we do a benefit-cost analysis of vaccines there's  no doubt a full range of benefits as measured by gains in economic productivity compared to catastrophic medical expenses which can occur due to our simple ignorance of not vaccinating the children.

Emami Healthy & Tasty Unveils Edible Oil Brand with Smart Balance Immunity Booster

Emami Agrotech Ltd., producer of well-known edible oil brand Emami Healthy & Tasty brings yet another innovation in its latest variant of edible oil for the consumers.   The new variant Emami Healthy & Tasty Smart Balance Immunity Booster Oil, offers unique value addition of “immunity’ in edible oil for the very first time in India. 

With 5 scientifically proven immunity boosting nutrients Vitamin A, C, E, D & Omega 3, Emami Healthy & Tasty Smart Balance Immunity Booster Oil, is the 1st edible oil brand in India that promises to enhance one’s immunity from within helping to fight health hazards as a part of one’s regular meal.

The pandemic attack of COVID 19 virus has exposed the vulnerability of humankind like never before. Building up immunity in face of such public health concerns has gained immense relevance in a new normal world all over again.  The new variant from the popular brand Emami Healthy & Tasty addresses this basic need of a consumer to build immunity from within.

Speaking on the launch, Mr. Aditya V. Agarwal, Director, Emami Group said, “There is a rising concern of family wellbeing in general in the post COVID 19 world. Consumers are in search of food products and supplements to enhance their family’s immunity.   Amidst this, our Research & Development team has developed India’s 1st Immunity Booster Cooking Oil under the brand name of Emami Healthy & Tasty that promsies to provide ‘Har Nivala, Immunity Wala’.

Emami has a legacy of deep consumer insight and offering product solutions for possible consumer need gaps and we believe that our target consumers would appreciate this product also which will help them to take care of their immunity derived from their daily & regular intake of food.”

Mr.  Manish Goenka, Director, Emami Group commented, “We do strongly believe that Emami Healthy & Tasty Smart Balance Immunity Booster Oil will delight our consumers with both its immunity boosting properties and taste.  It is the first time that any edible oil in India is having 5 key immunity building nutrients together to make this variant a one-stop solution to good health.  Moreover, addition of Vitamin C, well known for its immunity building properties, in an edible oil is also the very first in the country.  Use of Emami Healthy & Tasty Smart Balance Immunity Booster Oil will ensure immunity in every bite one takes.”

Emami Healthy & Tasty Smart Balance Immunity Booster Oil will be available nationally in 1 litre pouch pack priced at Rs 140.

Emami Healthy & Tasty is manufactured and marketed by Emami Agrotech Ltd, India’s second largest edible oil producer enjoying a turnover of over Rs.12500 crores.  Emami Agrotech Ltd, also produces Himani Best Choice range of edible oils, Rasoi Vanaspati, Bake Magic Speciality Fats and Emami Healthy & Tasty Mantra Spices & Tastemakers.  Renowned celebrities like Amitabh Bachchan, Salman Khan, Soumitra Chatterjee, Sabyasachi Chakraborty and others endorse the brands nationally and regionally.

#JawaKummunitiKustoms Online Contest Winners Announced

Introduced with the intention of keeping the Jawa Kommuniti engaged during the lockdown, the #JawaKommunitiKustoms online contest witnessed a stirring response from avid Jawa fans, followers and virtual design artists alike. The contest, hosted on the brand’s Instagram platform got huge engagement with the online community, with over half a million users interacting with the content in some form. For a niche subject like motorcycle customization the response was heartening to see. This also led to a healthy number of entries for the judges to choose from.

The contest wrapped up with the announcement of three winners picked by a panel of judges including the Classic Legend’s executives and design team. Soheil Kalarickal, an art director from Bangalore topped the scoreboard for his rendition of a Jawa forty two reimagined as a mix of brat and café racer style. Milind Solanki’s Cockatrice bagged the 1st runner-up position. Milind is an architect from Surat and gave the Jawa a classical adventure touring twist. Shri Lohar, a polytechnic graduate from Belgaum, used to Jawa forty two to add a minimalistic sports-scrambler touch to the bodywork.

The winner will get a custom hand-painted commemorative Jawa fuel tank while all three on the podium will be awarded signed copies of “The Forever Bike” coffee table book by Adil Jal Darukhanawala that details out the journey of Jawa brand and its motorcycles spread across nine decades.

But that’s not all for the winners! All three will also get an opportunity to intern with the company’s Design Team at its headquarters and a chance to turn their design concepts into reality. Classic Legends has offered this internship to enable these budding designers to hone their skills in terms of design as well as fabrication techniques.

About the contest:

The Jawa Kommuniti Kustoms contest was held between April 29th- May 3rd. 2020 in an effort to enhance community engagement and keep spirits up during the Covid-19 lockdown. Jawa aficionados were invited to share custom concepts of Jawa Motorcycles via sketches or 3D renders on Jawa Motorcycles' official social platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. The advantage of a virtual contest was that participants could truly let their imaginations run wild, and the entries received were both brilliant and detail-oriented, making it truly difficult to pick a winner.

About Classic Legends Pvt. Ltd.

Classic Legends Pvt. Ltd. is an Indian company established to re-introduce iconic marquee motorcycle brands in the market. Classic Legends aims to become India’s first true lifestyle company and provide opportunities to consumers to relive the heritage of classic brands by co-creating exciting product and service offerings along with the motorcycling ecosystem.

Jawa is a motorcycle brand from Czech Republic, erstwhile Czechoslovakia, with a 90-year legacy, which in its heydays exported classic, well-engineered and rugged motorcycles to more than 120 countries. It entered the Indian markets in the early 1960’s. The twin aspects of Jawa motorcycles - its beautiful design and strong performance character helped it not only to win hearts but also win many world titles.

From its marquee brands portfolio, Classic Legends is currently bringing alive the Jawa, not simply as a brand but a way of life. Classic Legends has leveraged the best of its partner capabilities in design and engineering along with the global expertise, to launch products that capture the DNA and ethos, of the original Jawa.

Ragini, Anupama and Anushree Visit Bounce, Bodycraft, and YLG Salons as Part of Godrej Professional Suraksha Salon Program

While salons are now open in Bengaluru, citizens are seeking assurance for safety and hygiene measures at salons. This could impact footfalls for salon industry, which is already burdened with over two months of no business. To support the salon industry during these testing times and address concerns of the people, actress Ragini Dwivedi, Anupama Gowda, and Anushree visited Bengaluru’s Bounce, Bodycraft and YLG salon chains respectively. This visit was organised by Godrej Professional as part of Suraksha Salon program, aiming to support salons with safety and well-being of customers and staff along with facilitating smooth post-lockdown operations. The three actresses themselves got a haircut at Bounce, Bodycraft and YLG salons and were impressed with the safety measures adopted.

Commenting on the support for the salon industry and her visit to Bounce salon, actress Ragini Dwivedi, said, “While people do want to visit salons, they have certain inhibitions involved as salons are high on tactile communication. I wanted to understand how the salons are implementing these measures on-ground and I was thrilled with the results. Right from my entry into the salon to the end of my appointment, salon ensured hygiene protocols are not compromised. I will urge people to visit salons without any fear and support the industry when it is needed the most.”

While allowing salons to open, Karnataka’s Department of Health & Family Welfare issued standard operating procedure which salons have to strictly abide. To boost public confidence, it is important to showcase how salons have opened up with proper safety measures in place. Ragini, Anupama and Anushree experienced hygiene measures at salons first-hand through this visit organised under Godrej Professional Suraksha Salon program. Known for its hair care, colour and styling products used by salons, Godrej Professional Suraksha Salon is helping salons in Bengaluru and many other cities get back to business and providing necessary guidance, resources and updates to salon owners.

Sharing her perspective on why she chose to visit the salon, Anupama Gowda, said, “Salon chains suffered deeply with no business for more than two months. With the lockdown being lifted, there are valid safety concerns amongst people who plan to re-visit salons. Thus, I decided to personally visited salon chains and experience safety measures instituted on-ground. I was happy to see that safety is a major priority for salons and people can be rest assured of it.”

“Although the salon chains had been severely impacted owing to the lockdown, I was really happy to see hygiene for both customers and staff becoming a topmost priority for salons now. After more than two months of lockdown, it was great to have my hair taken care of by professionals. It will be a win-win experience for salons and customers when both follow safety guidelines and adhere to the new norms mandated”, added, TV star and actress Anushree.

Godrej Professional Suraksha Salon is a nation-wide program including Bengaluru, aiming to support the salon industry as it moves to the new normal. Under the program, Godrej Professional has donated 15,000 litres of sanitizers and 10,000 re-usable masks for the well-being of the stylists. In addition, it is continuing to support salons with sanitizer & disposable kits for salon safety in a non-profit manner. The brand has curated ‘Suraksha Guidelines’, a comprehensive module on safety and hygiene, co-created with an expert with more than 25 years of experience in healthcare and hospitality sanitization. To address concerns about re-starting salon operations and avail sanitisation products on priority, a Salon Suraksha helpline is also setup under the program. This program is open for the entire fraternity and will support more than 10000 salons.

Is the Apple founder Steve Jobs dead?

Hijacking a Web feed of the Macworld 2009 conference, hackers have made spoof announcements about the death of Steve Jobs, chief executive of Apple.

Earlier this week, Jobs clarified persistent rumours about his health saying that he is suffering from health problems caused by a hormone imbalance.

However, the entire Web world was inundated with false claims of his demise via a fabricated live feed from Macworld Expo after hackers managed to breach security on a well-respected website.

The hackers fiddled with the micro-blogging feed at Macrumorslive.com, which was running smoothly through the first 23 minutes of the keynote speech given by Phil Schiller, senior vice president of marketing at Apple.

But, out of nowhere a message was posted that said, "Steve Jobs just died."

While the micro-blogging feed continued with developments about iPhoto, it was after three minutes that the feed came up with a clarification.

"Retraction on Steve Jobs comment ... we don't know how that got in our feed. Steve did not die," The Telegraph quoted the feed, as saying.

Another message came soon after, and said, "Oh wait, sorry, Steve did die. Our condolences."

The hackers were found to have affiliation with a website called 4Chan.The anonymous participants of 4Chan have discussed a number of high-profile online pranks, including attacks on the Church of Scientology and the breach of a Yahoo email account belonging to vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

"Our MacRumorsLive keynote coverage was hacked today, inserting inappropriate content into the text and photo feeds. We apologise for the inconvenience and are working to restore our services," read an item on Macrumors.com.

While bloggers have claimed that the site's passwords have been out on 4Chan since a day before the hack, but the claims have not been confirmed as yet.

Agencies