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Patient has an eye test at Venice Family Clinic in Venice, California, June 25, 2009.
Your new insurance advocate is AI
Health insurers are routinely using artificial intelligence and algorithms to evaluate insurance claims, but now the tables have turned. Doctors are increasingly turning to generative AI to write appeals for prior authorizations and to fight insurance denials.
A survey from the American Medical Association found doctors and their staff spend an average of 12 hours a week dealing with such denials, which insurance companies routinely issue, even in serious cases including cancer and HIV/AIDS care. Now, with the help of HIPAA-compliant apps like Doximity GPT, physicians can use the power of AI to generate persuasive reply letters, citing all the relevant medical research they need, in minutes.
One physician even told the New York Times that he tells the bot to make his letters four times longer: “If you’re going to put all kinds of barriers up for my patients, then when I fire back, I’m going to make it very time-consuming.”
So the next time you find yourself annoyed by a glitchy AI chatbot customer service, just remember, AI might help you get lifesaving drugs one day.
Wildfires spread after lightning strikes in British Columbia, Canada, on July 01, 2021.
Are parts of Canada and the US uninsurable?
One of Eurasia Group’s Top Risks is El Nino, the climate warming event that is triggering storms, floods, and fires and helping make this the warmest year on record. This will come as no surprise to most of you, who are either prepping for a weather event right now or having flashbacks to choking on smoke from the Canadian wildfires. The politics of climate change get repetitive and, frankly, can be boring— “yeah, yeah, we need to do something about global warming, but dude, have you seen the cost of housing these days …” Fair point. which is why the connection between the real cost of weather events and housing is so critical to keep in mind.
According to the Insurance Bureau of Canada, Canada’s insured damage from natural disasters and severe weather events in 2023 topped CA$3 billion dollars for the second year in a row. It was the fourth-worst year in history, and the effects are driving up the costs of insurance.
And this is where it gets scary. Right now, more than 1.5 million homes can’t get affordable flood insurance, IBC says. If risk costs for fires and floods go up much more, some places in North America will simply be uninsurable – unless governments step in, and that is truly costly. In a time when there is a housing shortage and costs are already sky-high, how can people build or buy a home if they can’t get insurance?
“As homeowners struggle with affordability challenges across Canada and the US, rising insurance premiums compound their difficulties,” says Craig Stewart, president of IBC. “However, this pales to the financial difficulties they face if insurance is unavailable, they suffer a flood or wildfire, and their home is damaged or destroyed. As climate change–driven events escalate and insured losses increase, insurers are taking a much closer look with improved data and, in some cases, AI, to flag high-risk regions of North America. New builds in high-risk areas will face difficulty in getting insurance and, possibly, financing as these trends continue.”
Insurers are looking at the last El Nino event in 2009-2010, where, in places like California, there were over 6,000 wildfires. Rates are now so high that many homeowners there can’t get affordable insurance.
So, the El Nino storm doesn’t just mean worrying that the roof over your head might get blown away – it’s that you might not be able to get a roof at all.
Insurance companies are feeling the heat of climate crisis
To understand how bad the problem of climate change has become, it helps to follow the money.
On GZERO World, Ian Bremmer breaks down the impact of climate change on property insurance premiums, which effectively quantifies the growing risk of catastrophic weather events. Last year alone, extreme weather damage cost the world a staggering $165 billion. Formerly once-in-a-generation weather events like the California wildfires of 2017 or Hurricane Harvey in 2018 are becoming more and more common, leading to devastating financial consequences for homeowners and hikes in insurance premiums.
Insurance companies are raising rates in high-risk areas like California, warning that soon, the state may be impossible to insure altogether. It’s another reminder that even though climate change has become a political issue, those with a financial interest in the impact of extreme weather can’t afford to be complacent. Sometimes, the coolest head in the room is the one stuck in the sand.
Watch the full interview on GZERO World: Climate change: are we overreacting?
Catch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer every week at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
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