Estimating the Overall Opportunity and Market Size of the International Private Medical Insurance Market in the UK and EU

In this latest iPMI Global In Focus article, iPMI Global takes a look at the opportunity and size of iPMI markets in the UK and EU, and asks the question, how much potential is there? Taken from the recent round table, UK & European International Private Medical Insurance Strategies.

Isabelle Moins, APRIL International: Most of the studies estimate the IPMI market size for Europe is around 7billions.

Andy Seale, Cigna Healthcare: Following the Covid-19 pandemic, we are seeing a real change in the demographic of expats looking to travel to different locations around Europe. UK and European expats now seem to be looking further afield for their expat journeys. In the past, a regular travel corridor would see someone move from one European country to another or to the UK. However, we are now beginning to regularly see Europeans looking to move to destinations such as South Africa.

There are multiple reasons for this, such as higher levels of inflation around Europe. The opportunity for growth is still very much there within Europe, there is just a change in dynamics in nationalities wanting cover and the locations that they are travelling to.

Jens Hohnwald, Foyer Global Health: We see growth in the region for both, inbound and outbound business. That growth is driven by accelerating global mobility of employees, increasing expatriation trends and the search for best-in-class medical cover and services by expatriates, digital nomads and more generally globally mobile people. It is difficult to get accurate data on market size and growth rates, because there is still a big difference between the people who are in theory eligible for an IPMI insurance and the people who are buying or going to buy one. 

Sheldon Kenton, Global Benefits Group: In Europe, the ability for someone to access the private healthcare systems of other countries has particular relevance, as people can easily travel to neighbouring countries to access care. Europe is also a centre for the global HNW population, who are looking for richer coverage and aspects of concierge as part of their private healthcare plan. This is on top of the benefit of having a plan which follows them globally and caters to the rise of secondary homes, either for investment or leisure.

The combined size of these markets we estimate to be a quarter of the total global market for IPMI. Whilst the need for coverage for traditional expats has slowed since covid, we are seeing small group and especially the HNW segment significantly grow in size.

Janette Hiscock, UnitedHealthcare Global: We believe the IPMI market size in the region to be 5.6B Euro, which represent 35% of the total IPMI market. Compound annual growth of approximately 6% is expected through 2025 but with changing market dynamics impacting which regions and subsectors drive this expansion.

Download UK & European International Private Medical Insurance Strategies 2023 In PDF Format