Launch of the Right to be Forgotten program

People who have been cancer patients in the past or are suffering from a chronic pathology present a heightened health risk. For this reason, these people may encounter major difficulties in obtaining outstanding balance insurance and, thereby, being granted a mortgage loan and becoming property owners.

In 2006 France started taking steps to facilitate access to outstanding balance insurance for people with a heightened health risk. Belgium drew inspiration from the work being done in France and published the Act of 4 April 2019 also establishing a “right to be forgotten” for these kinds of insurance policies.

From now on people declared as having been cured of a cancer for at least ten years have the possibility of taking out an “outstanding balance” insurance policy without any additional premium linked to this case history. The new law also makes provision for a reduction in the waiting times for other (cancer-related or chronic) pathologies. The KCE is responsible for reassessing the list of these pathologies every two years according to the medical advances made in their respect and the scientific data available on them.

We are already working on two ailments, type 1 diabetes (KCE report 314, 2019) and invasive breast cancer (publication scheduled in 2021). At the end of 2020 we launched a call for subjects with a view to identifying new health problems to be investigated as a matter of priority. This call was aimed at any person or association concerned by a cancer-related or chronic pathology (citizens, healthcare providers, patients’ or consumers’ associations, organisations, political decision-makers, etc.). Twenty-two proposals were submitted and are currently the subject of a selection procedure based on pre-established criteria.