Health Cover Too Expensive? Who Cancer-Only Cover Actually Suits

If the premium has become genuinely unaffordable, is cancelling the only option? No.

When comprehensive health cover is expensive enough to affect your quality of life, you are not choosing between gritting your teeth and going without. Cancer-only cover insures the single most dangerous and most expensive risk, usually for around a third of the premium of comprehensive cover. And because underwriting only looks at risks directly relevant to cancer, pre-existing conditions like high blood pressure and diabetes are generally not excluded.

I have written about why premiums have risen so sharply and what to do about it. This article is about who cancer-only cover suits.

Why single out cancer?

In New Zealand, emergencies and conditions that can wait are, realistically, things the public system handles. Cancer is different on two counts.

You cannot afford to wait. Outcomes are tightly linked to how fast you are diagnosed and how fast treatment starts. A place in a public queue is not a risk worth carrying.
The drugs are expensive. Many newer cancer medicines are not funded by Pharmac. The government added $604 million over four years to Pharmac’s cancer medicines budget in 2024, and drugs including Keytruda have progressively been funded (Pharmac) — but plenty of indications are still unfunded, early-stage triple-negative breast cancer among them (B2B News). Paying yourself can easily mean six figures in a year.

So as health cover gets more expensive, the real question is not whether to insure everything. It is whether you are willing to insure only the risk that would really hurt.

Three groups it suits best

Older people finding the premium hard to carry. What clients in their fifties and sixties say to me, almost word for word: over $300 a month and climbing towards $400 is a stretch, but going without feels reckless.
People who already have conditions like high blood pressure, high cholesterol or diabetes. None of those has a direct bearing on cancer. On comprehensive health cover they generate a stack of exclusions that make the policy look poor value. On cancer-only cover there are usually no exclusions at all.
People who were never going to go private for everything anyway. What you care about is being diagnosed quickly, getting the drugs and being able to pay for them if cancer is what happens.

What the numbers look like

A recent client of mine, in their fifties: comprehensive health cover worked out at close to $400 a month. Cancer-only cover for the same person was about $106. The gap is not subtle. (Premiums vary with age, health and insurer — treat this as an order of magnitude, not a quote.)

Three recent decisions

A couple who had already cancelled their cover because comprehensive premiums were beyond them. Talking it through, it was obvious how uneasy they were with having nothing at all. Cancer-only cover addressed exactly the thing they were most afraid of, at a price they could carry comfortably.
A new client in their fifties, going back and forth on price — that $400 against $106 comparison.
A client with a long health history, high blood pressure and cholesterol plus joint problems. On comprehensive cover, a whole cardiovascular category would have been excluded. None of it affects cancer cover, and their policy ended up with no exclusions at all.

What it does not replace, stated plainly

Cancer-only cover covers cancer. Non-cancer surgery, diagnostics and hospital admissions are not covered at all — those still go through the public system or come out of your own pocket. So it is a trade-off, not an upgrade. You give up some of the cover in exchange for a plan you can afford that answers the worst case.

If you are on the point of cancelling your health cover because of the premium, don’t do it yet. Message me and I will run the numbers for your age and health: what comprehensive costs, what cancer-only costs, and which is the more rational choice for you.

Want to know whether cancer-only cover suits you? Get in touch with Cornerstone Insurance.

Phone: +64 211 280 727 Email: amy.tao@cornerstonefs.co.nz WeChat: Amytaoingrace