Ho Kien Hung

To address rising insurance premiums and private healthcare costs by instilling discipline in healthcare consumption, particularly for minor procedures, MOH has mandated that new IP riders sold from April 1 can no longer cover the minimum IP deductibles set by the ministry.

This means that those with the new riders have to pay at least $1,500 before insurance coverage kicks in.

In addition, the co-payment cap will be doubled from the current $3,000 to $6,000, requiring policyholders to pay a larger portion of their bills.

Medical costs are expected to continue rising in 2026 globally, with the Asia-Pacific region reporting the highest increase at 14 per cent, according to the 2026 Global Medical Trends report published in November 2025 by global advisory, broking and solutions company WTW.

According to the report, Singapore is expected to overtake Indonesia to become the Asia-Pacific market with the highest medical inflation at 16.9 per cent.

Past WTW annual reports showed that medical inflation in Singapore had been under 10 per cent until 2024, when it rose to 12.3 per cent, and further grew to 15.5 per cent in 2025.

Factors leading to higher medical inflation here include an ageing population; adoption of costly new technologies, treatments and medication; and high operating expenses driven by increasing real estate prices and salaries due to a shortage of healthcare staff.

The Global Asia Insurance Partnership (GAIP), a non-profit tripartite partnership of the insurance industry, regulators and academia, said the health protection gap in Asia – the difference between healthcare costs and financial resources available, including insurance – is now the single largest protection gap. This is compared with other gaps such as mortality and catastrophe protection gaps.

“In Singapore, the discussion is not only about medical inflation, but also about broader healthcare cost trends, including utilisation, how care is delivered, and what these mean for long-term affordability,” said Ms Min Hung Cheng, chief executive officer of GAIP.

Medical cost inflation in Singapore set to hit record 16.9%; insurers’ body urges collective action The figure had stayed under 10 per cent until 2024. Read more at straitstimes.com. Read more at straitstimes.com.

Preventive surgeries for breast, ovarian cancer to be covered by Medishield Life & Medisave: Ong Ye Kung "With advances in medical science, the boundary between preventive and curative cure is increasingly blurred," Ong said.

• Real-life experience showed how an LPA allowed the family to make timely medical and financial decisions when her husband lost mental capacity.

• She set up her own LPA to prevent confusion or disputes between her children in the future.

• Without an LPA, families must apply for court-appointed deputyship, which is time-consuming and costly.

• An LPA provides legal clarity by appointing trusted donees to manage personal welfare and financial matters if mental capacity is lost.

Why a mother set up an LPA for her children Discover how a Lasting Power of Attorney can provide peace of mind and prevent family disputes over care decisions. Read more at straitstimes.com. Read more at straitstimes.com.

Pets are not part of matrimonial assets. Please take note.

Divorced woman turns to court to get 'her dogs' back from ex-husband, fails The court found that the dogs were matrimonial assets and that the woman was unable to prove that she owned the animals.

•Ensure good quality education is available for all and encourage cognitively stimulating activities in midlife
•Make hearing aids accessible for people with hearing loss and decrease harmful noise exposure
•Treat depression effectively
•Encourage use of helmets and head protection in contact sports and on bicycles
•Encourage exercise
•Reduce cigarette smoking
•Prevent, reduce, and treat high blood pressure
•Treat high cholesterol, especially during and after midlife
•Maintain a healthy weight and treat obesity as early as possible, in part to help prevent diabetes
•Reduce high alcohol consumption
•Prioritize age-friendly and supportive community environments and housing and reduce social isolation by facilitating participation in activities and living with others
•Make screening and treatment for vision loss accessible for all
•Reduce exposure to air pollution

The reason dementia rates are rising is surprisingly simple A recent study determined the lifetime risk of developing dementia is double that of previous estimates. But there’s good news here too.

Does being a corporation now mean it’s all about cost and profit? What happened to compassion and providing the necessary benefits to uphold the dignity of a person, whether comatose or not.

Court awards S$417,000 in damages in traffic death case, chides NTUC Income for 'unreasonable behaviour' Deputy Registrar Kim Bum Soo chided the "wholly unreasonable behaviour" of NTUC Income, the insurer of the defendants, for its "unfounded objections" to some claims and "casually impersonal stonewalling".

Great lesson to learn from!

Last year, my wife was diagnosed with cancer. This is how our family pulled through Mr Eddie Yew has spent his entire career advising clients on how to prepare for life's uncertainties, but was caught off-guard when his wife received a life-changing diagnosis in 2024.

Yes, the flair of a personal touch in terms of service and advice is notning compared to that of AI’s “human like”. On the flip side, financial advisers also need to touch up on their human aspect of better communicating and maintaining that human touch. It is even more imperative than ever advisers make it a point to breakthrough in their standards of “high touch”servicing and advisory.

IN FOCUS: Is ChatGPT better than a financial adviser? I put it to the test People are turning to AI chatbots for anything from writing emails to planning holidays. But can they be trusted with our finances?

“60% of workers in Singapore were living paycheck to paycheck in 2024 — notably higher than regional peers including China, South Korea, Japan and Indonesia, and above the Asia-Pacific average of 48%”

Case in point: The roles of financial planner is even more eminent in the advice and exercising deep empathy, the spending patterns and personality rather than the “what other products can be sold” mentality.

In one of the world’s most expensive cities, more workers are living paycheck to paycheck A cocktail of rising costs of living and growing prioritization for experiences is taking precedence over long-term financial planning, experts observed.

9 Middle-Class Habits Keeping You Broke, According to Codie Sanchez Often, the reasons we are broke feel beyond our control. And yes, there are some macro-level things that we can't do much about -- like the cost of living going up all around us while wages fail to...

https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/household-incomes-rise-in-2024-resident-households-received-more-support-from-government-schemes

“Another issue, flagged by the CPF Advisory Panel chairman Tan Chorh Chuan, is that people tend to underestimate their life expectancy.

This is the case not just internationally, but also in focus group discussions held by the CPF Advisory Panel, he said. Many participants did not plan much financially for retirement – and if they did, most “significantly underestimated” their life expectancy.”

Singapore still mulling design of possible CPF retirement investment scheme: PM Wong SINGAPORE is still studying the idea of a Central Provident Fund (CPF) retirement investment scheme, to see if such a programme can be designed to provide certainty of greater returns while minimising risk, said Prime Minister Lawrence Wong. Read more at The Business Times.