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Home / Legal principles of life insurance / - Your Will Can Be Changed After You Die.
The Inheritance (Provision for Family and dependents) Act 1975 gives the courts wide powers to vary the disposition of a deceased person’s estate.
A court can order that financial provision be made out of an estate if it is of the opinion that under the Will, or the laws of intestacy, the deceased failed to make reasonable provision for the applicant.
The persons who may apply for an order under the Act are as follows:
- registered civil partner
- former registered civil partner
- the spouse of the deceased
- a former spouse who has not remarried
- a person who has lived in the same household as the deceased as the husband or wife of the deceased during a period of two years prior to the date of death
- a child of the deceased
- anyone treated by the deceased as a child of the family
- any other person who immediately before the death was being maintained by the deceased.
NEWS
Blood pressure treatment promising for diabetics
22 November 2007 12:46:52
Diabetes sufferers and the obese people face the possibility of improved insurance prospects with a new treatment that lowers blood pressure, it has been suggested.
Scientists have been investigating direct renin inhibitors (DRIs), which are known to target the causes of raised blood pressure (hypertension) and offer increased protection against heart and renal disease, as well as the blindness associated with diabetes.
Peter Sever, professor of clinical pharmacology and therapeutics at Imperial College London, pointed out that inhibiting the activity of renin can ultimately prevent its "pathological consequences" in the tissues of the kidney, eye, heart, blood vessels and brain.
"Whilst any patient with elevated blood pressure will benefit from DRI therapies, patients with type 2 diabetes, who are prone to obesity and also cardiovascular, renal and eye damage, are also candidates for DRI therapy as an early component of blood pressure-lowering treatment," he remarked.
Further trials are being carried out to test the treatment's ability to reduce damage to the heart, kidneys and other organs, as well as cut the rate of deaths, heart attacks, strokes and renal failure in patients with diabetes and high blood pressure.
According to a recent review of public health, England has the highest levels of obesity in Europe and diabetes is on the rise.
Direct Life and Pensions Services Ltd are one of the UK's leading providers of life insurance, term life assurance, mortgage protection, and critical illnesslife insurance policies online
Standard Life ups income protection insurance
26 September 2007 15:01:57
Leading UK life insurance firm Standard Life has confirmed an overhaul of its income protection plan.
The life cover provider - currently making headlines for a mooted gatecrashing of the Friends Provident/Resolution merger - confirmed that the maximum benefit on its Income Protection Plan will be increased from £125,000 to £150,000.
Additionally, previous medical exclusions for the cover, such as pregnancy and HIV, have been removed, allowing more consumers to protect their family's future.
Andrew Cook, product marketing manager at Standard Life, explained the changes.
"Protecting your income should be as important as insuring your life or home," he commented.
"The changes to our plan will make it easier for customers to understand and advisers to recommend as any remaining plan exclusions have been removed. The increase in the maximum level of benefit will now allow us to cover up to £300,000 during a claim."
Health Insurance and Protection Magazine recently claimed that women could face higher premiums for income protection insurance, due to a presumed propensity towards missing work through illness or maternity leave.
'Infection' approach to cancer shows promise
01 November 2007 13:21:27
Cancer patients seeking critical illness cover or life insurance may be interested in the latest research from the Big Apple.
Scientists at New York's Albert Einstein College of Medicine believe the disease can be successfully treated by targeting the viruses that causes it.
Published in the latest issue of PloS One, their findings present the possibility of warding off cancer by destroying virus-infected cells before they turn cancerous.
Almost a fifth of human cancers are caused by pre-existing viral infections, with liver cancer brought on by the hepatitis B and C viruses, cervical cancer caused by human papillomaviruses and certain lymphomas stimulated by the Epstein-Barr virus.
Using a technique called radioimmunotherapy, the Einstein researchers targeted antibodies at specific protein targets in order to attack the viral antigens that cause cells to multiply out of control and become cancerous.
"Radioimmunotherapy not only worked against cervical and liver cancers, but in addition the radioactivity was confined entirely to the tumour masses, leaving healthy tissues undamaged," said Dr Ekaterina Dadachova, one of the study's authors.
Last year Dr Dadachova and her colleagues showed that radioimmunotherapy could also help halt HIV infection by targeting a viral protein on the surface of HIV-infected cells.
Direct Life and Pensions Services Ltd are one of the UK's leading providers of life insurance, term life assurance, mortgage protection, critical illness and life insurance advice online
22 November 2007 12:46:52
Diabetes sufferers and the obese people face the possibility of improved insurance prospects with a new treatment that lowers blood pressure, it has been suggested.
Scientists have been investigating direct renin inhibitors (DRIs), which are known to target the causes of raised blood pressure (hypertension) and offer increased protection against heart and renal disease, as well as the blindness associated with diabetes.
Peter Sever, professor of clinical pharmacology and therapeutics at Imperial College London, pointed out that inhibiting the activity of renin can ultimately prevent its "pathological consequences" in the tissues of the kidney, eye, heart, blood vessels and brain.
"Whilst any patient with elevated blood pressure will benefit from DRI therapies, patients with type 2 diabetes, who are prone to obesity and also cardiovascular, renal and eye damage, are also candidates for DRI therapy as an early component of blood pressure-lowering treatment," he remarked.
Further trials are being carried out to test the treatment's ability to reduce damage to the heart, kidneys and other organs, as well as cut the rate of deaths, heart attacks, strokes and renal failure in patients with diabetes and high blood pressure.
According to a recent review of public health, England has the highest levels of obesity in Europe and diabetes is on the rise.
Direct Life and Pensions Services Ltd are one of the UK's leading providers of life insurance, term life assurance, mortgage protection, and critical illnesslife insurance policies online
26 September 2007 15:01:57
Leading UK life insurance firm Standard Life has confirmed an overhaul of its income protection plan.
The life cover provider - currently making headlines for a mooted gatecrashing of the Friends Provident/Resolution merger - confirmed that the maximum benefit on its Income Protection Plan will be increased from £125,000 to £150,000.
Additionally, previous medical exclusions for the cover, such as pregnancy and HIV, have been removed, allowing more consumers to protect their family's future.
Andrew Cook, product marketing manager at Standard Life, explained the changes.
"Protecting your income should be as important as insuring your life or home," he commented.
"The changes to our plan will make it easier for customers to understand and advisers to recommend as any remaining plan exclusions have been removed. The increase in the maximum level of benefit will now allow us to cover up to £300,000 during a claim."
Health Insurance and Protection Magazine recently claimed that women could face higher premiums for income protection insurance, due to a presumed propensity towards missing work through illness or maternity leave.
01 November 2007 13:21:27
Cancer patients seeking critical illness cover or life insurance may be interested in the latest research from the Big Apple.
Scientists at New York's Albert Einstein College of Medicine believe the disease can be successfully treated by targeting the viruses that causes it.
Published in the latest issue of PloS One, their findings present the possibility of warding off cancer by destroying virus-infected cells before they turn cancerous.
Almost a fifth of human cancers are caused by pre-existing viral infections, with liver cancer brought on by the hepatitis B and C viruses, cervical cancer caused by human papillomaviruses and certain lymphomas stimulated by the Epstein-Barr virus.
Using a technique called radioimmunotherapy, the Einstein researchers targeted antibodies at specific protein targets in order to attack the viral antigens that cause cells to multiply out of control and become cancerous.
"Radioimmunotherapy not only worked against cervical and liver cancers, but in addition the radioactivity was confined entirely to the tumour masses, leaving healthy tissues undamaged," said Dr Ekaterina Dadachova, one of the study's authors.
Last year Dr Dadachova and her colleagues showed that radioimmunotherapy could also help halt HIV infection by targeting a viral protein on the surface of HIV-infected cells.
Direct Life and Pensions Services Ltd are one of the UK's leading providers of life insurance, term life assurance, mortgage protection, critical illness and life insurance advice online