Micro Insurance: A Safety Net With Too Many Holes?
Knowledge@Wharton, 30 September 2009
Developing and developed countries may have a lot more in common these days than many people think. Take health care. As the U.S. Congress continues to debate President Obama's controversial national health care plan, an innovative program similarly aiming to improve the lives of the poor is being launched on the other side of the globe in Bangladesh.
As part of a $34 million grant-giving facility launched last year by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the International Labor Organization (ILO), the Bangladeshi pilot is rolling out a micro insurance product specially tailored to the country's low-income rural residents, most of whom live on less than $2 a day. Designed for poor people who are not served by typical social or commercial insurance schemes, microinsurance -- risk-sharing products characterized by low premiums and coverage limits -- generally covers everything from life and health care to weather, property, agriculture, livestock and catastrophe.
Read full article for details of product, a general overview of microinsurance and where it differs from micro-credit.
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