Financial Group Advocates Against Insurance Companies Accused of Rejecting Claims for AIDS-Related Deaths

The South African Financial Sector Coalition on Tuesday launched a campaign targeting insurance companies that it says demand repayment of funeral expenses for any person who died from AIDS-related causes, Reuters/New Zealand Herald reports. Sharon Ekambaram of the AIDS Consortium said that her organization has received numerous complaints against several insurance companies about claims on policies that were repudiated when families were trying to bury family members who had died of AIDS-related illnesses. Louis Lewis, general manager of AVBOB, one of the country's largest "burial societies" -- insurance firms that sell policies to cover the cost of funerals -- said that clauses excluding coverage for AIDS-related deaths were in some of its older policies but had not been enforced since October 2001. He added, "At present our product does not require any medical or non-medical questions to be answered. We do not repudiate claims if we suspect that the client died of HIV/AIDS." Advocates from FSC said that they would monitor AVBOB's compliance with its policy and would target other firms accused of similar practices (Reuters/New Zealand Herald, 8/28).