Research on Factors Influencing the Demand of Chinese Commercial Health Insurance Caused by COVID-19

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 enhanced the need for commercial health insurance to address the sudden and overwhelming healthcare costs faced by families. This also led to an increase in the demand for health insurance services requiring insurance companies to innovate and develop suitable services. However, in the context of China, despite the huge potential for growth, health insurance market faces numerous challenges such as inadequate availability of tailored services, educational issues, income limitations, and emphasis on social insurance. To examine the issues and consider areas for improvements, this research investigated the impacts and effects of commercial health insurance from a macro perspective and considered potential recommendations to enhance the effective demand. This paper performed an empirical investigation by using the short panel data for regression analysis. The data was collected over ten years (2010 to 2019) involving 31 provinces in China to establish a fixed effect model. It employed FE and FGLS method to compare and analyze the impact of 9 factors while the health insurance premium was set as the dependent variable. Results showed that domestic economic development led to increasing residents' wealth and consumption levels has increased, including healthcare investments. Elevating the awareness of people through education can promote the development of the commercial health insurance demand, but the influence of urbanization level and the aging of the population remain to be demonstrated.