US insurer Cigna sees strong growth in Hong Kong and all international markets as health concerns persist after pandemic
- Since the Covid-19 pandemic began, Cigna has achieved double-digit growth across all of its international markets
- ‘Opportunities in the Greater Bay Area will promote the city’s insurance industry to grow for some time,’ says company’s international president
“One of the positives that came out of Covid was that it significantly increased people’s awareness about the importance of looking after their health,” Jason Sadler, the company’s president of international markets, said in an exclusive interview with the Post.
“Here in Hong Kong we have continued to see very attractive growth opportunities.”
Cigna, headquartered in Bloomfield, Connecticut, offers medical insurance and other healthcare services. With 189 million customers worldwide, it has operated in 30 international markets including Hong Kong for 90 years and has had a mainland joint venture with China Merchants Bank called Cigna-CMB since 2003.
Cigna Group’s international health business reported adjusted revenue of US$3.2 billion and pre-tax adjusted income from operations of US$253 million in 2022. From the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 until now, the firm has achieved double-digit growth across all of its international markets, including Hong Kong, mainland China and other markets in Asia-Pacific.
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Medical insurance in Hong Kong is a growing pie, with the gross premium for health and accident insurance rising 10.9 per cent year on year in the first quarter to HK$6.76 billion (US$867 million), according to the Insurance Authority’s data.
Cigna’s mainland joint venture has been very successful and has a lot of growth opportunities in health insurance and other health services, he said.
Now based in Dubai, Sadler spoke to the Post during his first visit to Hong Kong and mainland China in three years. Formerly based in Hong Kong as managing director of HSBC Insurance until 2010, Sadler joined Cigna later that year as CEO of global health, life and accident, then became president of global individual business in 2012, before taking his current post in 2014.
Hong Kong fully reopened its border in January, and about 10 million visitors came to the city in the first five months this year, according to data from the Tourism Board. Last year, the city recorded only 34,982 arrivals in this time frame, and 27,549 the year before.
“As people have returned to travel as normal, we are definitely seeing employers returning to send employees overseas for secondments,” Sadler said.
This trend has increased the demand for health insurance and healthcare services for expatriates around the world, boosting Cigna’s international health business, he said.
Besides expatriates, many local companies are also offering more medical health insurance and healthcare services for their local employees, he said.
During Covid, medical-insurance claims declined as some people avoided going to hospitals for conditions and operations that were not so urgent.
“One of the interesting things during Covid is that people were afraid to go to hospitals,” Sadler said. “As things started opening up, we began to see claims steadily come back again.”
Another lasting change from the pandemic period is higher awareness of mental health, as Covid led many people to feel stressed and in need of more support, Sadler said.
The survey showed that about 90 per cent of the nearly 12,000 respondents reported feeling stressed, while 87 per cent said they felt helpless, trapped or defeated and 86 per cent expressed feelings of being detached or alone in the world.
“One of the big emerging health issues that we have seen over the years is the growth of mental-health illness, and that spiked significantly during Covid-19,” Sadler said.
