I applaud Dr Desmond Wai's response ("Analyse data to find cause of rising insurance claims"; Oct 17) to the recent report by the Life Insurance Association of Singapore on rising health insurance claims.

The facts revealed to the public are far from compelling without scrutiny of the root cause of rising insurance claims.

It would be important to determine how, as a group, policyholders with riders stack up against the rest, in terms of contributing to the health insurance industry's bottom line.

This revelation will be an objective assessment which balances the higher premiums (vis-a-vis riders) that policyholders pay for access to private healthcare against the assertion that insurance claims by certain quarters make this system untenable.

Hopefully, this will dispel notions that this initiative to control healthcare costs is an exercise in cherry-picking masquerading as cost control.

Law Khin Choy