Deputies from the Russian State Duma, representing the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) and led by party leader Leonid Slutsky, have submitted a package of draft laws proposing penalties for insurance companies. The legislation aims to prohibit insurers from denying voluntary health insurance (DMS) coverage to elderly citizens and individuals with disabilities. Violations of this proposed rule could result in fines reaching up to 300,000 rubles.
The explanatory note accompanying the bills states that the proposed law would prevent the refusal of insurance contracts based solely on factors such as gender, race, skin color, nationality, language, origin, property, family, social, and official status, age, disability, place of residence, attitude towards religion, beliefs, or membership in public associations.
The initiators highlight that while the Bank of Russia in 2022 recommended insurance organizations avoid refusing services to persons with disabilities and the elderly based purely on age or disability, this recommendation has not significantly impacted the insurance market, and the issue persists.
According to the supporting documents, an unjustified refusal by an insurance organization, foreign insurance organization, insurance agent, or broker to conclude public contracts, or the imposition of additional services on the policyholder, would incur administrative fines. These fines would range from 20,000 to 50,000 rubles for officials and 100,000 to 300,000 rubles for legal entities.
It is also noted that insurance agents, brokers, or employees of insurance organizations involved in concluding contracts, processing applications and appeals from financial service consumers, and handling monetary transactions, would be held administratively liable as officials for such violations.
Sergey Leonov, head of the State Duma Committee on Health Protection (LDPR), explained that a common practice in Russia is for insurance companies to refuse to issue or sell DMS policies to certain individuals. He stated, “When we talk about DMS, we are talking about a person being ready to buy a DMS policy with a certain expanded list of services using their own funds, in case they fall ill or get injured.”
Leonov continued, “Consequently, insurance companies find it unprofitable to sell voluntary health insurance policies to people who already have health problems. That is, either disabled people or elderly people, as they are more prone to illness. In this case, the insurance company incurs additional insurance risks if the person falls ill or visits a medical institution for some reason. Moreover, they can go to any private clinic, and the private clinic will provide certain services at the expense of the insurance company. We believe that insurance companies do not have the right to refuse to issue a policy, and we are explicitly writing this into legislation.”
The parliamentarian also noted that many companies and large corporations already include voluntary health insurance policies in their social packages. Therefore, if a disabled or elderly employee works in a large corporation, organizations face difficulties because they cannot insure these employees. “Therefore, we believe that our proposal will be fair, and we hope for the support of the State Duma,” the deputy concluded.
