The story of a blind girl whose travel insurance application was rejected by a top insurance broker has kicked off a debate over the rights of disabled people in Nanjing, capital of east China's Jiangsu Province.

 

Wu Jing, a 20-year-old student at Nanjing Foreign Language School, unsuccessfully applied for travel insurance last week from the Nanjing Branch of Taiping Life Insurance Co, Ltd, as she is going to Switzerland next month for an exchange trip.

 

"An employee accepted my 690 yuan (US$86) premium, gave me the invoice and asked me to come and get the statement the next day. But half an hour later he called me to cancel the deal," Wu was quoted by the local Yangtze Evening Post as saying.

 

Taiping Life Insurance said it was too risky to provide travel insurance for a disabled person, according to Wu.

 

An employee surnamed Wang with Taiping Life Insurance confirmed the report during a telephone interview with China Daily, but he refused to give further details, saying only that it was a decision made by company management.

 

Wu Jing shot to fame in the city after she won gold medals in the swimming competition at the 2003 National Games for the Disabled.

 

She is also the first blind student in her school.

 

"There are now about 60 million disabled people in the country. They are the people most in need of social security. It makes no sense for insurance companies to exclude them," said Zhang Xiaoqing, Head of the Nanjing Disabled Persons' Federation.

 

Zhang told China Daily most disabled people can take care of themselves in daily life and are not as accident-prone as imagined.

 

However, refusing to insure disabled people is an unwritten rule in the industry, according to a manager of Xinhua Life Insurance who declined to reveal his name.

 

According to the manager, even though a few insurance companies have already provided certain items of insurance to the disabled, they all limit the scope of insurance products and value, and raise the premiums.

 

"After all, the occurrence rate of diseases and accidents for a disabled person is definitely higher than a normal person. Insurance firms aim for profit. We are not a charity organization that helps the disadvantaged at the expense of our own interests," said the manager.

 

But according to Ding Xiaolin, chief lawyer with Nanjing-based Guotai Xinhua Law Firm, insurance companies, especially State-owned ones, should shoulder their social responsibility while pursuing their economic goals.

 

Rejection 'violates law'

 

"The rejection by the insurance company violates the country's Law on the Protection of Disabled Persons, which states clearly that the disabled should enjoy the same legal rights as healthy people in economy, society, family life and so on," he said.

 

"The insurance company can raise the premium based on risks, but cannot simply shut their doors to the disabled," he suggested.

 

Similar cases have been reported throughout the country.

 

It was reported that no company was willing to provide insurance for hundreds of disabled students at a special training school for mentally and physically disabled children in Foshan, south China's Guangdong Province.

 

Experts like Ding warn that the government should issue new and preferential policies to motivate insurance companies to open their services to the disabled, and encourage disabled people to get insurance.

 

(China Daily July 26, 2006)