Mon, 2nd Feb 2026

In this week's Insurance News Wrap, TAL's Health Sense Plus program extends its services to include income protection insurance, offering a 5% discount on premiums for new policies in the initial two-year period. Mental health issues have become the primary reason for disability claims in Australia, with nearly a third of these claims now due to mental health conditions, costing over $2.2 billion in retail claims last year alone. This led the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority to call for urgent overhauls in the income protection insurance sector following a loss of $2.5 billion over the past five years. Lastly, Rhodian Group announced the new Marine insurance agency, Marinex Underwriting, planned to meet the challenges of Australian marine businesses with growth in global marine insurance premiums at 5.9%.