What are we paying Health Insurance for?

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Every employer is paying KD 50 per year as insurance for each employee whenever the residence of the employees is renewed.

What is this for?

Is it medical insurance?

If so, what are the benefits for the employees. It is understood that the insurance company will pay compensation to the employee or his family in case of serious accident or death of the employee during working hours.

Kindly enlighten us.

Name withheld
Answer: The KD 50 health insurance is for expatriates only and the only thing that this provides is “subsidized” health services and that in the public sector hospitals only.

Most of the private hospitals, if not all, do not provide health services on this health insurance. Expatriates have to pay for each service at the private hospitals.

This annual fee of KD 50 only provides “access” to the public healthcare facilities. Additional services, such as X-rays or specialized tests result in additional expenses, unrelated to the annual fee.

You get these services at a subsidized rate, because visitors to the country have to pay the full cost. The health insurance is mandatory for all expatriates and their residence will only be renewed until the validity date of the Kuwait insurance policy.

Please also remember that health insurance is different from the insurance that the company gets done to cover work-related injuries.

This has got nothing to do with the health insurance.

You would also do well to read Articles 89 to 97 of the Kuwait Labor Law on “Work injuries and occupational diseases”.

These articles clearly state the action to be taken by the company in case of work-related injuries. The articles also mention that a person is also covered by insurance if he has an accident when he is on his way to work or going home from work. This also dispels the notion that workrelated injuries are only those which take place at the work site.

This news has been read 12511 times!