There aren’t many things in life that are more important than your health and well-being. Health insurance naturally plays a significant part in ensuring that you can stay healthy, treat illnesses quickly and of course protect your life savings when faced with a serious illness.
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Despite the prominent role that health insurance has in all of our lives, only a few people take the time to fully understand health insurance in Germany. That holds true for Germans and non-Germany alike!
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Admittedly, the German insurance system does not make it easy and having two parallel systems in the form of Public Health Insurance (aka GKV, for the German “Gesetzliche Krankenversicherung) and Private Health Insurance (aka PKV, for the German “ Private Krankenversicherung”) does not help. We feel that we have the unique position to give you that knowledge, to enable you to understand the systems and act accordingly.

In the upcoming weeks, we will do just that, we shed a little light on the (sometimes crazily) complex world of the German health insurance system(s) – one main aspect at a time:

• Part 1: Why are there two systems of health insurance in Germany?
• Part 2: Eligibility or who is allowed into what system?
• Part 3: Differences in coverage.
• Part 4: Differences in premiums. (TBD)
• Part 5: Premiums in old age. (TBD)
• Part 6: Taxes, family coverage and family planning. (TBD)
• Part 7: How to switch between the two systems? (TBD)
• Part 8: Nursing-care insurance. (TBD)
• Part 9: How to find the right coverage for you? (TBD)
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Even though you might think “wow, this is so much information, now I know everything there is ever to know about this topic”, we have to tell you right here and now that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

There are many more aspects such as the depth of financing of the systems, the political component (especially in GKV), social security aspects, billing processes and many more that we are happy to discuss personally with you.

We will update this post as soon as a new part is published, so that you can navigate to each part in your own time and read up on posts that you may have missed. So strap in and enjoy the ride!