The effect of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling on the private Medical Insurance sector is likely to be "negligible" according to an industry body.
Speaking to COVER, Lindsey Joseph, executive committee member for the Association of Medical Insurance Intermediaries (AMII), added that she saw a way forward in more sophisticated underwriting.
She said: "The vast majority of PMI providers do not have premiums for gender and for those that do the difference in premium is not particularly significant. For those few with older policies on the books they will need to be adjusted, and in those circumstances we recommend specialist advice."
AMII has noted an opportunity for the rise of more medically based underwriting within the protection sector. Joseph said: "The advocate general said you cannot differentiate based on gender and the stats that support that.
"What she is not saying is that, within that, there will be specific issues that are specific to gender. As long as you can differentiate on biological grounds there might be a way around this. It might be that insurers need to look at a far more sophisticated model that does not highlight gender but looks at biological differences."
