On 30 September 2020, Discovery hosted its first ever virtual workshop with over 10,000 brokers, to announce Discovery Health's benefits and contribution update for 2021. Discovery reiterates that its core purpose is to make people healthier and enhance and protect their lives. 2020 has been a very challenging year from the healthcare perspective. According to Discovery Health's statistics, during the lockdown period over the last few months, the number of elective surgeries has drastically reduced as members chose to delay these treatments and avoid going to the hospital. The COVID pandemic meant most of the healthcare resources were directed towards the testing and treating COVID patients. No increase in contributions up until 30 June 2021Discovery Health understands that everyone has gone through financial strain during the lockdown, so we are excited to announce that Discovery has decided to freeze all scheme contribution increase across all plans for the first 6 months of 2021. However, this alleviation is not long term, thus the contribution increase will be announced during the second quarter of the year and implemented on 1 July 2021. The expected increase will be CPI + 2%, capped at 5.9%. Doing so, they are looking to assist members in affordability, sustainability and spreading the financial impact everyone has gone through during 2020. Based on its data analysis and observations during the pandemic, four trends have emerged: Utilisaiton discontinuity - how the COVID pandemic has disrupted the normal medical utilisation pattern. Technology - the pandemic has pushed the use of technology to the fore, to enable digital healthcare services from the comfort of one's home. Quality care Access - recognising that millions of South Africans don't have medical aid, Discovery announces a solution to make healthcare affordable and accessible to all. We use a few infographics to illustrate these trends: Discovery Health's experience shows the COVID pandemic peaked around June to August. What has helped the scheme was from late March to now the number of non-COVID hospital admissions have reduced by 20% to 30% compared to last year. Discovery Health has always been innovative and progressive with technology. Since the lockdown began, virtual consultations have increased by 8-fold. Discovery Health now introduces Connected Care, where it enables a range of appropriate home-based healthcare services for all levels of care. The picture above shows the TytoHome diagnostic device Discovery is bringing into the country and offering its members. Discovery's research shows 50% of South Africans are on "pre-paid" healthcare. They have launched Prepaid Health to cater for all South Africans. This new offering launching at the end of December 2020 is one of the exciting products where good healthcare is available to anyone on a pay-as-your-go basis. Discovery leverages on its network, so you have access to good healthcare at a discounted rate. For members on hospital plans only, they can also purchase these vouchers for their day-to-day benefits. Discovery Health Plan Guides 2021Below are the Discovery Health Plan Guide brochures for 2021 (note these are still subject to approval by the Council for Medical Schemes): Next: Other highlights in Discovery Health Product Update 2021
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorKevin Yeh Archives
January 2025
Categories
All
|