One day the first grade teacher was reading the story of Chicken Little to her class.  She came to the part where Chicken Little warns the Farmer. She read, ??and Chicken Little went up to the Farmer and said ?the sky is falling, the sky is falling?!? The teacher than asked the class ?And what do you think the Farmer said??  One little girl raised her hand, ?I think he said, ?Holy Sh*t!  A talking chicken!??

After decades of discussing ?risk? with prospects, clients, family and friends it ceases to amaze me of how oblivious most of them are to real risks they face.  Yes they will get sick. Many will suffer a disability sometime before age 65.  If one lives long enough they are likely to need long-term care.  And yes they will die.  Yet, and I know I?m going to offend someone here; they?d rather wring their hands about global warming or watch 24/7 coverage of Brittany Spear?s last meltdown, than rationally plan for the probable eventualities that they face.

So I, like many of you I?m sure, often feel like a talking chicken as opposed to a rational and informed harbinger of sound long-term care planning.  And yes, my level of patience with the long list of head fakes and excuses as to why folks can?t or don?t want to purchase long-term care insurance (of course until they can?t qualify for it any longer) grows shorter by the day. However, I?m sure that medical doctors grow frustrated with their overweight patients who don?t go on a diet and financial advisors struggle with clients who refuse to save for the retirement that they say they want.  So we soldier on with the message in hopes that the light will go on for more and more people.

With this in mind, my next few Blog postings will be devoted to findings from two very important studies that were recently released; The AHIP/Life Plans 15-Year Study of Buyers and Non-Buyers of Long-Term Care Insurance and The CQ (Congressional Quarterly) Researcher Report on Aging Boomers. We plan to post these and other reports on our website soon, www.bjfim.com, however, if you would like me to email these to you let me know at, barry@paradigmins.com.

Now it is true that Chicken Little mistook an acorn falling on her head for the sky actually falling.  But she did at the end of the story decide to carry an umbrella, given to her by the king, to avoid the risk of getting knocked in the head by an oversized seed.  But at least she didn?t have to worry about the sky falling anymore.  So be a king; go sell your clients a long-term care insurance umbrella because there?s an acorn the size of an oak tree headed their way!

barry@paradigmins.com

As you are probably aware, November 4-10 has been designated Long-Term Care Awareness Week.  Throughout the week stakeholders from across the industry will be working to promote the value of long-term care insurance and encouraging greater awareness of LTCI as a key aspect of financial planning and health security.

AHIP plans to use this opportunity to officially kickoff the long-term repositioning campaign and to mobilize our grassroots network of LTC Champions by encouraging members to talk about the benefits of LTCI and recruit new members.  Below is a brief rundown of our planned efforts for the week.

Teleconference to Release New Data on LTCI Awareness

Working with Edelman and StrategyOne, AHIP will host a teleconference on Monday, November 5 at 11:30 am (Eastern) to kickoff the long-term repositioning campaign and release preliminary data on lack of LTCI awareness, especially among the Baby Boom generation.

AHIP President and CEO Karen Ignagni will moderate the teleconference.  She will discuss the need for increased education to improve awareness, the need for incentives to encourage individuals to purchase LTCI, and our positive legislative agenda for the future.  A representative from StrategyOne will discuss some of the findings from their survey and focus group research.

The teleconference will target reporters who cover LTCI, personal finance, retirement, and seniors’ issues.  A media advisory will be distributed in advance and we plan continued outreach to reporters after the event.

The key message: American Baby Boomers are confused about long-term care and especially confused about whether they are covered, who will pay for the care and how much it will cost.

‘        30 percent of Baby Boomers say they have coverage, even though other official estimates suggest about 5 percent of them have long-term care insurance. This likely means millions of Americans erroneously think they are protected against the cost of long-term care insurance.

‘        54 percent of Baby Boomers erroneously think Medicare covers long-term care costs.

‘        44 percent of Baby Boomers erroneously believe other health insurance covers long-term care costs.

‘        Americans overestimate the cost of long-term care insurance and under-estimate the cost of nursing home care.

Mobilize Long-Term Care Champions Network

During Long-Term Care Awareness Week, AHIP will mobilize the Long-Term Care Champions Network, our national grassroots organization comprised of more than 5,000 members, including policyholders, their family members, caregivers, health care professionals, agents and concerned citizens with an interest in long-term care issues.

Starting on Friday, November 1, AHIP will contact the LTC Champions to encourage them to do the following activities during LTC Awareness Week:

‘         Recruit at least 10 people to join the coalition – such as family members, caregivers and/or clients;

‘         Go to the Champions Network website and send a letter to their legislators; and

‘         Write and submit an LTE to their local/regional paper on their positive experience with LTCI.

Press Release on LTC Awareness Week Activities

AHIP will put out a press release highlighting our industry’s efforts on behalf of Long-Term Care Awareness Week.  It will include the new data released on the teleconference as well as our efforts to mobilize the Champions network and recruit new members.

Objectives

Through these efforts, we hope to accomplish the following:

‘        Drive positive media coverage of LTCI and the value it provides to policyholders;

‘        Highlight the lack of awareness of LTCI, especially among Baby Boomers, and position our industry as taking a proactive role to address this issue; and

‘        Develop relationships with key reporters and establish ourselves as a go to source for industry-wide data and comment for future stories.

If you have any questions or suggestions on other efforts we can undertake with you during LTC Awareness Week, please let us know.

New Clinton Ad on Long-Term Care Insurance Running in Iowa and New Hampshire

Additionally, we want to bring to your attention Senator Hilary Clinton’s latest campaign ad where she talks about long-term care insurance.  The following is the script for the ad:

Announcer: When George Bush threatened to privatize social security, Hillary was there fighting every step of the way to stop him.

And she was there for every senior who needs round-the-clock-Care, creating a law to ease the burden on family caregivers.

She’s still there fighting to stop long term care insurance scams that prey on the elderly. These days, it seems like every candidate on earth is coming here for You.

But which candidate has been there for you all along’

Hillary Clinton: I’m Hillary Clinton and I approved this message.

Click here to view the entire ad online: http://www.hillaryclinton.com/video/62.aspx.

We want to alert you to this ad as an example of how LTCI is being talked about on the campaign trail in the continuing nexus of politics and scrutiny of our industry.

As always, be sure to let us know if you have any comments or questions.

I will be communicating with AHIP shortly to see how we can access you to the conference call and to the other activities of the week. I will be back in the office Monday.  Please call or email me if you have any questions.

barry@paradigmins.com

Here is a sampling of some of the recent reports and websites that I have discovered from my daily emails from the Center For Long-Term Care Reform, Inc:

The Latest on Alzheimer’s Disease

NIH Alzheimer’s Report — August 2007

Mapping Older America ’ A Brookings Institute Report

http://www3.brookings.edu/views/articles/200705frey.pdf

Providing Long-Term Care for the Oldest Old

http://www.tcf.org/publications/economicsinequality/goldbergbrief.pdf

I find reviewing the introductions and executive summaries of these reports very valuable and from time to time I will get into the data to gather more background.  Regardless of your desire for detail, Steve’s summaries of the reports provide you with a looking glass into great research that provides valuable insights into long-term care and long-term care insurance issues.

The Center is a non-profit; it is supported by sponsors and subscribers.  I recommend that you take some time on the website to see for yourself how valuable it can be for increasing your knowledge and ability to explain long-term care issues to your clients.  I also encourage you to become a subscriber.  Steve and his son Damon are providing invaluable service to our country.

Another cool website that I discovered while I was leaping from one link to another yesterday is called Real Age.  Like many websites Real Age has its share of gratuitous advertising. However, one of its functionalities is to provide you with a test that will compare your chronological age with your actual age based on a very extensive online questionnaire that asks you about your health and lifestyle.  I didn’t do as badly as I thought I would but I’d sure like to do better!  Check it out and let me know what you think.

We hope that you have a great weekend.  I will be traveling most of next week but I hope to stay in touch.

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