NU Online News Service
Reinsurers might have a hard time protecting the U.S. life insurance industry against a "bird flu" pandemic comparable to the "Spanish influenza" pandemic that swept over the world in 1918.
A major bird flu pandemic could lead to about $133 billion in group and individual life claims in the United States, and even a moderate pandemic, comparable to the 1968 "Hong Kong flu" epidemic, could generate about $31 billion in U.S. group and individual life claims, according to Steven Weisbart, an economist at the Insurance Information Institute, New York.
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Allison Bell
Allison Bell, a senior reporter at ThinkAdvisor and BenefitsPRO, previously was an associate editor at National Underwriter Life & Health. She has a bachelor's degree in economics from Washington University in St. Louis and a master's degree in journalism from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. She can be reached through X at @Think_Allison.
