Discovery Health Outlines Future Plans

October 5 - The Chief Executive of Discovery Health, one of South Africa's largest medical insurance groups, said that expanding into Africa on a grand scale was not part of the company's major goals for the future.

This is in contrast to the plans of some of Discovery's largest rivals such as Liberty Health and Sechaba Medical Solutions, which have branched out significantly into East and West Africa in recent years.

Discovery Health, which has over 40% share of the South African health insurance market, said that it would possibly make a minor acquisition in Africa, details of which would be announced by the end of 2009.

"It will be very small and it won't be a key financial decision," said the Chief Executive, Neville Koopowitz. "Africa will never be a bigger part of the company."

Looking to the next financial year's performance, Koopowitz said that he expects a 4-5% growth, focusing mainly on low income earners in the population through its KeyCare product.

Koopowitz believes that plans to introduce the National Health Insurance scheme in the coming year would not challenge Discovery Health's growth in a major way.

He said that the NHI would only serve as a threat if it managed to provide the same standards currently offered by private health insurance products, something he doesn't see happening in the near future.

"We support the NHI and we have confidence in the skills set that we have and are fairly confident that there will be a role for private medical schemes along with the NHI," he said, "unless the NHI could miraculously cover services that you would access if you were a member of a medical aid."