With March being Prostate Cancer Awareness Month, Zurich’ s Nicky Bray explains why family history is important – and how it is assessed in underwriting.
Prostate Cancer Awareness Month puts a spotlight on one of the most common cancers affecting men – and a recurring point of confusion in underwriting: what insurers really mean by‘ family history’.
“ Some people provide far too much information about distant relatives, while others provide very little and don’ t understand why we ask the questions we do,” says Nicky Bray, chief underwriter at Zurich.
“ We don’ t require a full family tree. We’ re trying to understand whether there’ s a significant inherited risk that could affect someone during the term of the policy.”
For underwriters, the focus is not on every condition that has ever appeared in a family, but on patterns that suggest an increased likelihood of early diagnosis or death.
Why family history matters
Family history has long been part of insurance underwriting, but recent research has underlined just how influential genetics can be in shaping both longevity and disease risk.
Heritability accounts for around 55 % of human lifespan, according to a large genetic analysis published in Science earlier this year 1. Researchers analysed data from twins and siblings born across several decades in Scandinavia and the US.
Meanwhile, a Swedish population study published in 2024 found that each additional decade of parental lifespan was associated with a roughly 22 % lower risk of all-cause mortality in their children, as well as reduced risk of hospitalisation across multiple disease categories 2.
For underwriters, the relevance of family history is straightforward: it helps to determine whether an inherited risk could affect someone during the term of a policy.
“ We’ re looking for patterns that suggest someone may be more likely to develop a serious condition earlier in life,” says Bray.“ That’ s why age at diagnosis is so important. Conditions that appear at a younger age are more likely to have a genetic component and are more relevant from an underwriting perspective.”
To read the rest of this article, click here.
1
Genes influence human lifespan far more than thought, new study suggests
2
Consequences of heterogeneity in aging: parental age at death predicts midlife all-cause mortality and hospitalization in a Swedish national birth cohort
April 2026 | 23