Road to recovery: Insurance industry takes on ‘new normal’

THE insurance industry’s overall output contracted by 4.8 percent, dropping to P58 billion in the first three months of 2020, from P61 billion during the same period last year, according to data released by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA). The last time that the industry suffered a negative real growth rate was during the 2009 financial crisis.

This statistics is a confirmation that the insurance industry was not spared the economic fallout from the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic as a result of the lockdown measures that the government imposed to prevent the virus’ spread. Consequently, the healthcare industry has also been overwhelmed by the rising number of Covid-19 cases. The PSA reported that the economy shrank by 0.2 percent in the first three months of 2020, which was attributed by many analysts to the pandemic.