KUALA LUMPUR, August 6 — The Ministry of Finance (MOF) insisted today that Great Eastern did not benefit from mySalam after the insurance company rejected a cancer patient’s critical illness claim.
MOF said the insurance premiums paid by the government, if they exceeded the claim payouts made under the health protection scheme, would be reimbursed back into the mySalam trust fund that received an RM2 billion contribution from Singapore-based Great Eastern, in exchange for not divesting its shares to local investors.
“The government reiterates that there is no profit element for Great Eastern Holdings nor Great Eastern Takaful Berhad (GETB) in mySalam.
“Hence this removes any incentives for GETB as mySalam’s takaful operator to not pay out any qualified claims,” MOF said in a statement.
According to MOF, the bottom 40 per cent (B40) aged between 18 and 55 can claim an RM8,000 lump sum cash payout from mySalam if they are diagnosed with any of 36 critical illnesses (before January 1 this year) at a Ministry of Health, university, or military hospital.
“The recent case of a 48-year-old lorry driver with stage 4 cancer of the colon had his critical illness claim denied because he did not submit his medical report from a government hospital doctor. GETB is ready to assist on the appeal process for the RM8,000 critical illness benefit,” said MOF.
Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM) leader Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj wrote last Friday that a lorry driver, whom he had diagnosed with stage four cancer and referred to a public hospital, was rejected for mySalam’s critical illness coverage because the B40 person’s diagnosis was made at a private facility.
The Finance Ministry told CodeBlue that as of July 30, mySalam approved 135 claims for critical illness and 1,078 hospitalisation claims, totalling RM1,372,750 in payouts. The payout sum is a tiny fraction of the insurance premiums that the government paid GETB, amounting to about RM400 million a year, since the insurance company contributed RM2 billion to the mySalam fund for five years.
