The Opportunity of a Lifetime

If insurers want to know the future, or to see the best approximation of it, they should review the events of 2018 so they can prepare themselves for the excitement of 2019. They should expand their emphasis on the theme of safety by rewarding companies and individuals for, respectively, teaching and learning basic life support (BLS) skills. Chief among these skills is CPR. It is a skill that saves lives by saving the world entire, by rescuing the entire economy, too, because the savings for insurers are substantial. These savings translate into more affordable and accessible insurance. They reduce the number of death benefits (an oxymoron, indeed) that insurers otherwise have to honor on behalf of a decedent's loved ones. They also allow insurers to better promote life-saving techniques like CPR, which is itself a reminder of how the simplest things sometimes yield the greatest returns, some of which are measurable while others are of incalculable worth. My advice to insurers is to partner with the best, for the best reasons, to achieve the best results. My advice is to seek, and to subsidize, the work of an organization such as National Health Care Provider Solutions (NHCPS), whose mission is to save lives, whose Save a Life Initiative empowers people to learn how to perform CPR, whose many initiatives enable men and women to become CPR-certified. See also: Digital Distribution in Life Insurance   If insurers take this advice, they will at least improve the odds that someone can save a life. They will go beyond the merely fiscal by accomplishing the metaphysical, placing in people’s hands a skill that expresses itself in the universal language of action. It lets people do for themselves what time does not permit others to do for someone in need of immediate medical attention. It enables members of a community to be the first ones to respond when there is no time to wait for first responders to arrive on the scene of a crisis or an emergency. To do these things is to strengthen the bond between insurers and individuals. To do these things is to do the right thing, period, because ethics trump economics. That is to say, if insurers put morals ahead of money, they will establish goodwill among the very people they want to reach. They will have a degree of credibility no amount of advertising can buy and no attempt of marketing can match. They will have authenticity, thanks to their commitment to BLS and CPR. That commitment should increase in 2019, as it can increase the number of lives people save. See also: New Health Metrics in Life Insurance   It can also save the insurance industry from wasting time and money on more costly, and far less effective, efforts. It can—and does—remind us to prioritize what matters most: life. Inspired by professionals, and imbued with the ability to act with the utmost professionalism, BLS and CPR offer insurers the opportunity of a lifetime. Now is the time for them to seize the moment.