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IRDAI: Health Insurance companies will cover mental illness under medical policies
IRDAI: Health Insurance companies will cover mental illness under medical policies: Details, Aim, Background
The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) recently in August 2018, had directed all the insurance companies to make a provision to cover mental illness also in insurance policies.
IRDAI had referred to Section 21(4) of the Mental Healthcare Act, 2O17 which states that every insurer shall make provision for medical insurance for treatment of mental illness on the same basis as is available for treatment of physical illness. The Act came into force on 29th May 2018.
Therefore, all insurance companies were directed to comply with the aforesaid provisions of the Mental Healthcare Act, 2017 with immediate effect.
Background
Earlier, health insurance policies did not cover mental illnesses. All of them exclude mental and psychiatric conditions.
As per the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences’ National Mental Health Survey of India of 2016-17, nearly 15 percent of Indian adults are in need of active intervention for one or more mental health issues.
About Mental Illness
Mental Illness is defined as a substantial disorder of thinking, mood, perception, orientation or memory that grossly impairs ability to meet the ordinary demands of life, judgment, behavior, capacity to recognise reality, or mental conditions associated with the abuse of alcohol and drugs, but does not include mental retardation which is a condition of incomplete or arrested development of mind of a person, specially characterised by sub-normality of intelligence.
