Irish Life pay out €54m in death claims

Irish Life paid €54m in respect of 1,055 death claims last year — an average of just over €51,000 per claim.

A worrying trend was that alcohol was a contributory factor in one of in six accident-related claims, but the biggest killer was cancer.

The largest single death payment was just over €1m in respect of a 50-year-old male professional who died of pancreatic cancer.

The largest single payment in respect of a female was for €467,000 in respect of a professional who died of breast cancer.

Martin Duffy, head of underwriting at Irish Life, said last year the company paid out more than €78m in death and specified illness claims.

“Cancer still remains the greatest single killer and unfortunately the number of cancer-related specified Illness claims continues to rise,” he said.

The number of heart-related claims, however, has continued to fall. This may be due to earlier diagnosis of the condition with people undergoing more regular health screens and taking the appropriate steps to reducing the likelihood of being incapacitated.

Mr Duffy said the fact 16% of accident-related death claims were related to alcohol “reflects a worrying trend” if this were to continue.

An analysis of 2007 death claims also reflects the dominance of cancer and heart-related conditions with cancer accounting for 47% of the total of 1,055 claims and heart-related conditions accounting for approximately 22%.

Adult accident claims made up 8% of the total claims.