It is rare to find young people in Cameroon who enjoy talking about the possibilities of terminal illnesses or death.
But when you visit most health facilities in the country, you find young people hospitalized in their numbers with varied illnesses.
Young people make up a greater proportion of the workforce in the country, and thus are commonly involved in accidents of all sorts which usually results to death.
Life is very important at all ages and has to be insured.
The Importance of life insurance cannot be over emphasized, but among young people in the country, it is not something to write home about.
What most of them think is to safe money in regular microfinance Institutions, but the danger here is that most constantly shuts their doors in the country.
Life insurance may not be the first concern for young people in Cameroon, but putting it off, may cost them a lot.
This article visits some general concerns about life insurance among young people in Cameroon.
Special attention is given to the various factors that deter young people from making informed decisions about life insurance.
Misconceptions about Life Insurance
Jude is a-24-year old engineer who works with a construction company in Yaounde. He is still a bachelor, with no child depending on him.
Getting a life insurance policy for him is not at the top of his priority list.
He thinks life insurance is for the rich, the elderly, and for those having some health complications.
“I am still very young and healthy, and I am still not financially stable, I don’t think it is the best time for me to purchase a life insurance policy” Jude said.
These are some of the common misconceptions about Life Insurance among young people in the country.
That is why like Jude, most of them think they are too young to need life cover which to them seem very expensive.
Out of 130 young Cameroonians we talked to, none of them have ever thought of purchasing a life insurance policy.
What they forget to understand is that life insurance premiums are very much cheaper with young people than with the elderly.
The longer you wait, the more expensive life insurance becomes.
That is why experts advice that it is while you are young and healthy where you should purchase life insurance, and this for reasons that we shall see in this article.
It becomes even more expensive when you have children.
Ironically, most if not all the young people we interviewed are planning to get married in future, have children and build a home.
Buying life insurance at a younger age locks in lower premiums and reduces the total amount of money to be spent over the course of one’s lifetime.
Even before one starts investing for long term goals, it is important to get life insurance cover for oneself and family members, an insurer confided in News Upfront.
For example, with a life insurance policy, should anything happens to you, (which is not the wish of this reporter) your youthful debts, and other charges will not be transferred to your dependants, because your have secured all.
It is common to witness situations in Cameroon where the death of a family head is the beginning of hardship for the family, just because of the absence of a life insurance policy.
A young man to purchase life insurance is like s/he who has paid for all bills during his lifetime.
Should anything happens to him/her, his dependants will not suffer, his empire would not crumble, rather s/he has secured the future of all his loved ones even in his absence.
Failing to secure Life Insurance as a young person takes you off the Financial benefits listed above.
Ones health is another determining factor on how much to pay for life insurance.
This also to a greater extend dispells the misconception that only the sick are liable to secure life insurance policies.
This is because the chances of being diagnosed with an illness increases with age.
In Cameroon like elsewhere, most Insurance companies advocate for investing in life insurance between the ages of 20 and 30.
“If a young man at 20 purchases a life insurance policy while healthy, no matter what will happen to him in future like a health complication, there will be no need for further finances” Dika Serge, an insurer told us adding that;
“When you wait until you are diagnosed with an illness, the amount you pay for life insurance increases greatly.”
Cameroonians pay special attention and importance to funerals and burials.
Most often, families go through hell to give a befiting burial to their loved ones.
With a life insurance policy, young people stand the chances of automatically taking off the stress of preparing for their funeral/burial costs or any other related financial expenses.
It is common to see corpses abandoned in hospitals, others buried out of their comfort zones in the country, and at times in mass graves by council officials due to lack of finances.
Such pictures among young people can easily be reversed thanks to life insurance policies.
Even if you are extremely healthy with an active lifestyle, and a well balanced diet, life is unpredictable.
Hence there is no better moment to be prepared than now, that is when you are young and at your strongest.
