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• A Free Health Insurance2.0 Summit
  

  Warner Pacific and Norvax to Host a Free Health Insurance2.0 Summit for Producers, General Agents and Carriers

  -- October 9th Symposium Focuses on How Agents and Brokers Can Succeed in an Online Health InsuranceMarketplace -- Participants Will Also Have the Opportunity to Network and Sharpen Their Sales Skills

  Last update: 2:09 p.m. EDT Sept. 9, 2008
  SOUTHFIELD, Mich., Sep 09, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Warner Pacific, a top-producing general agency for many of the nation's leading carriers, will team with Norvax, the #1 provider of technology and Internet tools for insurance sales, to host the "Health Insurance2.0 Summit" on Thursday, October 9, 2008, at the Courtyard by Marriott in Farmington Hills, MI.
  "Technology and the Internet are creating new challenges for producers, but also new opportunities," said Steve Selinsky, Vice President of Warner Pacific. "This highly informative summit is for any broker or agent who understands how dynamic the Health Insuranceindustry is -- and wants to have the knowledge and tools to succeed in it."
  Representatives from Aetna, Assurant, Humana One, IAC and LifeSecure, Warner Pacific's five key carrier partners, will kick off the symposium with brief presentations on their program and technology updates designed to increase broker production.
  Following them will be the keynote speaker, Jeremiah Desmarais, Vice President of Marketing for Norvax, who will explore the changing landscape of the health insurance industry -- and how producers can succeed in a market that's increasingly online. Desmarais will provide case studies and effective tips that producers can immediately use to capture their share of the expanding online market.
  Brokers and agents can then sharpen their phone-selling skills and learn how to increase their close ratios with Internet leads during a one-hour workshop with Rob Liano, a national insurance sales trainer with Norvax University. In addition to building up a successful home-based agency, Liano is a professional sales trainer who travels throughout the country to train agents and call centers in successful insurance sales.
  Producers, carrier representatives and general agents will then have an opportunity to network with each other, as well as with the symposium speakers and presenters.
  This free symposium is open to all Health Insuranceagents, brokers, general agencies and carrier representatives. To RSVP, please call Colleen Johnston at 800-801-2300 or visit www.warnerpacific.com and click on "Events."
  Registration and check-in begins at 8:00 AM. The program will begin at 8:30 AM and conclude at 12:30 PM. The Courtyard by Marriott Farmington Hills is located at 31525 W. Twelve Mile Road, Farmington Hills, MI 48334.
  ABOUT WARNER PACIFIC
  Warner Pacific is a top producing general agency for many of the nation's largest Health Insurancecarriers. Founded in 1982, Warner Pacific has been an innovator in providing sales and service support and has the distinction of being the leading resource center for industry information and education serving over 7,000 brokers and independent agents.
  ABOUT NORVAX
  Norvax Inc. is a leading developer of Web-based sales and customer communication tools that connect and help consumers, insurance brokers, agents and carriers transact Health Insurancebusiness more efficiently. From tools for building lead-generating Websites to Health Insurancequote engines and email autoresponders that automatically include updated Health Insurancequotes, Norvax's Health Insurancetechnology lets agents increase sales, cut administrative time and reduce expenses by initiating customer contact faster and automatically maintaining around-the-clock communications with prospects. Founded in 2001, Norvax was named among the Top 10 fastest-growing software companies in the U.S. in 2007 by Inc Magazine. Norvax is privately held and headquartered in Chicago. For more information, visit www.Norvax.com.
  SOURCE: Warner Pacific
  Warner Pacific
  Ken Doyle, 800-801-2300, ext. 138
  
  　

  
  
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• Britain Considers Bigger Role for Private Health I
  

  Britain Considers Bigger Role for Private Health Insurance

  
  In Britain, long the home of publicly funded health care, the health system may be taking on a more private-sector look, with employers potentially picking up more of the tab.
  

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  September 9, 2008
  Cancer treatment is at the nexus of the debate over top-ups. Some drugs licensed for marketing within the United Kingdom are barred from NHS use on cost-effectiveness grounds established by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. The agency evaluates clinical trial data on drugs and other medical technologies and assesses their cost-effectiveness as measured in British pounds per quality-adjusted life year, or a year of good health.
  
  
  Britain Considers Bigger Role for Private Health Insurance
  In Britain, long the home of publicly funded health care, the health system may be taking on a more private-sector look, with employers potentially picking up more of the tab.
  
  Top government officials are discussing a policy proposal known as "top-ups" for the National Health Service in England and Wales, which would allow insurers to offer NHS patients coverage for treatment, particularly expensive drugs, not covered by the service.
  
  Sometimes paid by employers as an employee benefit, private medical insurance supplements NHS services in the United Kingdom. However, current practice requires that once patients seek care outside the NHS, they must continue to receive all care for that condition outside NHS facilities. If authorized, the NHS top-up plan would aim to pay for uncovered treatments while patients still receive the remainder of care from the NHS.
  
  "It's a whole new market that hasn't been explored yet," said Philip Blackburn, senior economist at health care consultant Laing & Buisson Ltd. in London. "It will change the landscape.
  
  "It remains to be seen how much extra money the consumer has for health care,” he added. “The market is unlikely to explode overnight. It will be digested gradually."
  
  Alan Johnson, the government minister in charge of health care, has asked Mike Richards, the Department of Health's national clinical director for cancer, to review the proposal and report back in October.
  
  According to a July report from Laing & Buisson, 4.2 million people in the United Kingdom purchased Health Insurancepolicies or enrolled in self-insured employer plans at the beginning of 2008, a rise of 1.3 percent over 2007. Those plans covered nearly 7.5 million people, or 12.3 percent of the population. Individual policies shrank by 0.5 percent while corporate demand rose 2.3 percent, according to the report.
  
  Drugs that cost less than 20,000 pounds, or $37,168, per quality-adjusted life year are usually judged as cost-effective. Those that cost 30,000 pounds, or $55,752, or more are unlikely to be approved. Those that fall between require additional evidence and scrutiny, according to a spokesman for the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence.
  
  Most recently, the agency drafted a decision that proposed barring NHS patients with advanced or metastatic kidney cancer from having access to Sutent and three other cancer-treatment drugs. Sutent costs more than 3,000 pounds for a six-week cycle; while it increased the length of time some patients survived without any disease progression, it did not meet the cost-effectiveness threshold.
  
  Ignoring current practice, one company has already jumped into the top-up market. Armed with a legal opinion in favor of top-ups that was written by a government attorney, Taunton, England-based Western Provident Association, a nonprofit insurer, in April 2007 began offering a plan covering up to 50,000 pounds of cancer medications. The annual premium is the policyholder's age plus a 5 percent tax.
  
  Six weeks ago, the association began offering a more comprehensive plan that covers an array of preventive and routine care costs, including a 200-pound payment each time a policyholder has a child. An option allows adding cancer drugs to the policy.
  
  "All we're trying to do is complement the gaps in the NHS," a company spokesman said. "Whatever [the government] decides in October, it's an opportunity for us. We're ahead of the curve. We will evolve the policy if we need to."
  
  The spokesman would not disclose how many people purchased such policies.
  
  For employers, the potential change in government policy gives them a chance to re-evaluate the health benefits they provide, restructure how they are provided and how they are financed—whether through employer contributions or salary deductions, especially if top-up coverage costs less than traditional medical insurance.
  
  "If you're effectively self-funding the medical plan, it allows you to say, `Let's let people get coverage from the NHS for the things that NHS does well, and we'll supply some sort of supplementary coverage for the things people have to wait for,’ ” said Paul Ashcroft, a principal at Mercer who heads the company's London-based health