PROVIDING yourself with an insurance cover may not be all that easyin the near future. Insurance companiesare now looking at the prospect ofgenetic testing to weed out high riskpeople or else insisting on theirpayment of higher premiums. This willthen allow insurance companies tocompensate for 'adverse selection' -the selection of such clients who havegrounds to believe they will become illor die young.
Genetic testing recently revealed how six per cent of breast cancer caseshave been-due'to the presence of twospecific genes (Down To Earth, Vol 4,No 17). The detection of such genescould thus make a person a bad risk forthe insurance companies who wouldwant to deny providing insurance cover.
In the US, insurance companies arealready advising people wanting toinsure their lives for large sums to firstundergo genetic testing. Predictions arethat such a trend could also spreadto the UK in a period of five years. Asgenetic testing, which is now in itsinfancy, takes off, it could bring abouta radical change on how insurancepolicies are made.