Statutory health insurance companies are obliged to hold 20 percent of a monthly expense as reserves. By the end of 2024, the reserves would have fallen on average to around six percent of a monthly expenditure, the umbrella association explained. “The obligation to top up continues in 2026 and will require additional contribution rate increases.”
In addition, the statutory health insurance industry doubts that the measures adopted can really cover the deficit. “I think it is questionable whether the average additional contribution will remain stable at 2.9 percent in the coming year,” said the chairwoman of the BKK umbrella organization, Anne-Kathrin Klemm, to the “Politico Newsletter Industrie & Handel” about a possible increase in health insurance contributions. “Many health insurance funds will have to increase their contributions again in 2026 in order to replenish their reserves.”
The AOK federal association also expressed doubts as to whether Warken’s law achieved the desired goal of stable additional contributions. It remains “questionable whether the savings package of immediate measures in the hospital and health insurance sector, which was put together at the last few meters, will actually have the expected relief effects,” explained Vice CEO Jens Martin Hoyer.
