Month: April 2021

Protect the ones you love.

You buy life insurance because it’s the best way to protect your loved ones. It’s a financial decision…kind of. It’s an emotional decision…sort of. It’s about love and caring and the future…most definitely.

Still, millions of people buy life insurance every year for reasons that are often difficult to express. At the same time, the reasons are simple and obvious. That’s the thing about life insurance. The idea may be simple, but the reasons behind it cut deep, to our very core—almost to an instinctive level.

At the heart of it, if you’re like most people, you buy life insurance for six very good reasons.

• Life insurance is about taking care of loved ones.

It’s about meeting responsibilities and keeping promises. You view your decision to purchase life insurance from your family’s point of view, not your own. You see life insurance as a tool that protects your spouse and children from the potentially devastating financial losses that can result if you die prematurely.

• Life insurance is for the living.

It’s not about you. You know that, should anything happen to you, the life insurance you have purchased is in place to protect and provide financial relief for those who must carry on without you. It’s about them.

• Life insurance is an expression of love and caring.

Because you care about your family, you want to ensure the financial security of family members if you’re suddenly not around to provide it.

• Should you die, the proceeds will help you keep the promises you have made to the people who are important to you.

By protecting their financial future, you’re enabling your loved ones to maintain their lifestyle, if something unexpected should happen to you.

• Life insurance buys time and options.

Too often, when an income earner dies, survivors are forced to make tough, dramatic decisions—and to do so quickly. They have to make the decisions at a time when they may not be emotionally in a position to make good choices. Life insurance gives survivors a chance to adjust over time rather than having to move to a downsized home or find a new job right away.

Your life insurance gives your family choices by providing the benefits to help pay off debts, to help meet housing payments and ongoing living expenses, to help fund college educations for your children or grandchildren, and much, much more.

• Life insurance provides cash when it’s needed most.

Your life insurance policy can deliver a specified sum of money at the exact time of need. Upon your death, your family can be assured that the amount you’ve chosen—perhaps hundreds of thousands of dollars, maybe even millions—will be there almost immediately. And that death benefit is generally not subject to federal income taxes. For example, a $500,000 policy provides $500,000 in death benefit proceeds.

If you are not completely certain that your coverage is in line with your family’s needs, please contact your New York Life agent. When you meet, you’ll work together to determine how much coverage you need, review what products and policies are right for you, and review cost comparisons.

Connect with a financial professional to customize a plan that works best for you.

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More exercise means less risk of developing severe Covid, according to a compelling new study of physical activity and coronavirus hospitalizations. The study, which involved almost 50,000 Californians who developed Covid, found that those who had been the most active before falling ill were the least likely to be hospitalized or die as a result of their illness.

The data were gathered before Covid vaccines became available and do not suggest that exercise can substitute in any way for immunization. But they do intimate that regular exercise — whether it’s going for a swim, walk, run or bike ride — can substantially lower our chances of becoming seriously ill if we do become infected.

Scientists have known for some time that aerobically fit people are less likely to catch colds and other viral infections and recover more quickly than people who are out of shape, in part because exercise can amplify immune responses. Better fitness also heightens antibody responses to vaccines against influenza and other illnesses

But infections with the novel coronavirus are so new that little has been known about whether, and how, physical activity and fitness might affect risks for becoming ill with Covid. A few recent studies, however, have seemed encouraging. In one, which was published in February in The International Journal of Obesity, people who could walk quickly, an accepted gauge of aerobic fitness, developed severe Covid at much lower rates than sluggish walkers, even if the quick striders had obesity, a known risk factor for severe disease. In another study of older adults in Europe, greater grip strength, an indicator of general muscle health, signaled lowered risks for Covid hospitalizations.

But those studies looked at indirect measures of people’s aerobic or muscular fitness and not their actual, everyday exercise habits, so they cannot tell us if getting up and moving — or staying still — changes the calculus of Covid risks.

So, for the new study, which was published Tuesday in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, researchers and physicians at Kaiser Permanente Southern California, the University of California, San Diego, and other institutions decided to compare information about how often people exercised with whether they wound up hospitalized this past year because of Covid.

The Kaiser Permanente health care system was well suited for this investigation, because, since 2009, it has included exercise as a “vital sign” during patient visits. In practice, this means doctors and nurses ask patients how many days each week they exercise, such as by walking briskly, and for how many minutes each time, then add that data to the patient’s medical record.

Now, the researchers drew anonymized records for 48,440 adult men and women who used the Kaiser health care system, had their exercise habits checked at least three times in recent years and, in 2020, had been diagnosed with Covid-19. The researchers grouped the men and women by workout routines, with the least active group exercising for 10 minutes or less most weeks; the most active for at least 150 minutes a week; and the somewhat-active group occupying the territory in between.

The researchers gathered data, too, about each person’s known risk factors for severe Covid, including their age, smoking habits, weight, and any history of cancer, diabetes, organ transplants, kidney problems and other serious, underlying conditions.

Then the researchers crosschecked numbers, with arresting results. People in the least-active group, who almost never exercised, wound up hospitalized because of Covid at twice the rate of people in the most-active group, and were subsequently about two-and-a-half times more likely to die. Even compared to people in the somewhat-active group, they were hospitalized about 20 percent more often and were about 30 percent more likely to die.

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Summer is soon upon us, which means boating season! When looking to insure a boat that was just purchased, here are coverages to consider and details the carrier will likely ask:

Coverages to consider:

• Physical Damage Coverage – coverage for collision with another boat or submerged object.
• Liability Coverage – coverage for bodily injury or property damage of others.
• Personal Property – coverage including, but not limited to, fishing equipment, clothing and other boat-related equipment such as life vests.
• Medical Coverage – coverage for injuries sustained in an accident with your boat.

Details the carrier will want to know:

• Age of the boat
• Value of the boat, motor and trailer
• How the boat is used?
• Where the boat is primarily used?
• Type of motor and horsepower

Call Stapleton today at 419-720-6446 for all of your boat insurance needs. We’ll make sure to find the right policy and coverages so you can enjoy the summer on the water worry-free!

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COVID-19 insurance policies are increasingly joining passports and sunscreen as vacation staples, creating opportunities for insurers as more countries require mandatory coverage in case visitors fall ill from the coronavirus.

Airline bookings are on the rise in some regions, driving cautious hopes of a revival in summer traffic, but also raising fears among tourist destinations of getting hit with bills should vacationers become stranded by the virus.

More than a dozen countries from Aruba to Thailand require COVID-19 coverage for visitors, with Jordan the latest to consider such protections, organizers of an emergency services plan told Reuters.

The market for all types of COVID-19 travel coverage is estimated to be between $30 billion to $40 billion a year, according to travel insurance consultant Robyn Ingle, with companies like AXA and AIG underwriting protection.

But a surge in demand for COVID-19 coverage also means insurers could be on the hook for big payouts should another wave of infections lead to large numbers of cancellations or tourists getting sick.

“Travel insurance and protection services are taking off at pace with travel as it resumes, said Dan Richards, chief executive for travel risk and crisis management firm Global Rescue.

COVID-19 insurance benefits typically cover treatment up to $100,000, and could include coronavirus testing costs and services like evacuation or local burial or cremation. These benefits, introduced by insurers in mid-2020, are sold either as add-ons or as separate policies with coverage for illness or quarantine.

A travel insurance plan that includes trip protection, medical expense coverage for COVID-19 and protection for baggage and personal effects typically costs 4% to 8% of the dollar value of the trip, Murchland said.

While the pandemic has battered travel, demand for coverage has created opportunity for the hard-hit insurance industry and a niche to develop new products, companies said.

For example in June, Seven Corners introduced an optional medical travel plan with coverage for coronavirus expenses, Murchland said. By year’s end, the product with coronavirus coverage generated about 80% of total medical travel plan sales.

Seven Corners also saw a 20% rise in travelers buying highly priced “cancel for any reason” policies in 2020. The policies cover cancellation costs related to the virus.

Some countries have mandated travel insurance for incoming visitors – either by including it in their entry or visa fees or by requiring proof of coverage, said insurer World Nomads.

Jordan’s Tourism Bureau was not available for comment.

It is not clear how coverage demand will evolve as many more people become inoculated against the coronavirus with vaccines.

Frank Comito, a special advisor to the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association, said some budget travelers have complained about mandatory coverage. And some countries could discontinue or relax the requirement as “we move away from the pandemic.”

Rifai, former secretary general of the UN’s World Tourism Organization, said he expects countries will continue requiring coverage as the vaccines “will take years” to roll out globally.

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