"If I feel discriminated against? I can't do the same as before because I had cancer". Maria Noguera, 48, had triple-negative breast cancer in 2019. She had just finished paying off her mortgage, for which she had taken out life insurance, and wanted to renew it. They automatically refused him due to the fact that he was in an oncological process. He had a year and a half treatment and there is no trace of the tumor. Now he has tried again to take out a life policy, in several companies. No success The appearance of the word cancer in the medical history implies, with all certainty, an increase in the premium, but often also the impossibility of accessing financial products. Those affected claim the so-called right to oncological oblivion so as not to be burdened forever with the artificial sequelae of the disease.
"Recently we had a meeting in Barcelona and I was surprised that I met people who had suffered from childhood leukemia, that is, during childhood, who were denied a mortgage when they are already 30 years old", exclaims Noguera. Although Spanish law does not require you to take out life insurance to apply for a loan or mortgage, there are banking entities that request or recommend it as a payment guarantee. The problem arises when the company denies the policy to people with an illness or who have had cancer.
A report by the Josep Carreras foundation delves into the testimony of 400 young people aged between 18 and 35 diagnosed with acute leukemia and lymphomas (between 4,500 and 5,000 cases a year in this age group in Spain), in order to "determine the impact on the lives of patients who manage to get ahead". Almost half of the respondents (47%) express difficulties in applying for a loan. 83% state that they have had problems taking out life insurance and 73% signing a death policy.
"We are facing a paradigm shift," points out Clara Rosàs, manager of the Catalan Federation of Cancer Organizations (Fecec). "Fortunately, the survival of women from cancer is 64%, that of men is 56% and more and more people are overcoming and chronicling the disease, in other words difficulties are appearing that we did not consider a few years ago years", he argues: "There is discrimination against people who have had the disease to access financial products because they ask for insurance and the insurance companies measure the risk. They refuse it or make you pay an extra cost".
According to Fecec, there are many people who have not been able to access a financial product because of their medical history. The organization calls for the updated survival statistics by type of cancer to be applied (many people who have the same probability of relapse as others who have not had the disease). On the other hand, it claims a law of the right to be forgotten that obliges to delete the medical history once a period of time has passed.
A year ago the European Parliament urged that, before 2025, all countries guarantee the right to be forgotten in cancer. "Insurance companies and banks should not take into account the medical history of people affected by cancer", states the proposal, which aims to ensure that survivors "are not discriminated against compared to other consumers". A large number of Member States have adopted this legal guarantee. In 2017, France was a pioneer in recognizing a right that generally benefits patients after 10 years without relapse. This term is reduced to 5 years after finishing the therapeutic protocol for cancers diagnosed before the age of 15. Your terms of access to loans and insurance are not affected by surcharges or higher interest rates. In addition, the law incorporates a reference table that establishes, disease by disease, the maximum time for people to be able to access these products under the same conditions as people who have not suffered from cancer.
In Spain, Law 4/2018 prohibits discriminating in the procurement of insurance against a person for having HIV or other health conditions, although it does not specify what "other health conditions" are. The Junts al Congres group has presented a series of questions to the Government to find out if it plans to promote legal changes to guarantee the oncological right to be forgotten, bearing in mind that Spain is one of the few EU countries that still does not have a “specific regulation to shield access to financial products such as loans, mortgages or insurance for cancer survivors”.
"These people need an answer", exclaims Junts deputy Pilar Calvo, while waiting for the Government's position, before the 24th. "There are thousands of people every year who, in addition to overcoming cancer, find it very difficult to resume his life normally and without discrimination", he adds.
"When it happens to you at the age of 60 or 65, the impact may not be so serious because the probability that you will apply for a mortgage at that age is what it is. But for young people, the impact is much more important", emphasizes Clara Rosàs.
Five years ago, the resident of Elche Juan Antonio Sepulcre, who was 29, collected more than 150,000 signatures with which he managed to make a bank that had refused him a mortgage reconsider. In 2008, he was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a cancerous bone tumor that usually occurs in teenagers, and he overcame it after almost a year of treatment. "As soon as they introduce the word cancer into life insurance, their admissions system denies it," he said. Without insurance, even though the petitioner was completely cured, the financial institution initially refused to give him the loan.
