Health Minister John Boyce made a statement not so long ago which drew the ire of quite a few Bajans, he indicated the days of free healthcare may be numbered and private plans may be the norm and not an exception.

In launching the “Liberator Plus” policy at Collymore Rock this morning, Michael Austin – Vice President of Sales & Marketing for Guardian Life, urged Barbadians to act before it is mandated that health plans are privately managed and get in on the ground floor {CLICK ON FOLLOWING ICON FOR FULL AUDIO, SMARTPHONE AND TABLET USERS – PLEASE CLICK ON Mr Austin‘s NAME FOR LINK TO OPEN AUDIO IN NEW TAB}

“Liberator Plus” is different in the sense that subscribers can decide when their cash surrender will arrive – there’s a choice of either 75, 85 or 100. Not only that, but people can purchase a plan from as far down as 70. During the Q&A CBC’s Ryan Broomes established with Guardian how this is not the first policy in the region to offer 100 years, Mr Austin also outlined what other benefits can accrue. {CLICK ON FOLLOWING ICON FOR FULL AUDIO, SMARTPHONE AND TABLET USERS – PLEASE CLICK ON Mr Austin’s NAME FOR LINK TO OPEN AUDIO IN NEW TAB}

Earlier in the year, Guardian also rolled out a policy which enabled parents to save if their children decided on college or University, this is known as the SOS or Student Opportunity Saver and there was also what Branch Manager Amado Marcano called their Unregistered RRSP called the IPI which means Individual Personal Investor – but Mr Marcano says it is still too soon to gauge the IPI’s success as opposed to the SOS {CLICK ON FOLLOWING ICON FOR FULL AUDIO, SMARTPHONE AND TABLET USERS – PLEASE CLICK ON Mr Marcano’s NAME FOR LINK TO OPEN AUDIO IN NEW TAB}

It could be argued the reason behind Guardian’s confidence was the level of profit achieved by the third quarter, unlike the Central Bank recently, Michael Austin was quite candid with the Media when approached on the matter {CLICK ON FOLLOWING ICON FOR FULL AUDIO, SMARTPHONE AND TABLET USERS – PLEASE CLICK ON Mr Austin‘s NAME FOR LINK TO OPEN AUDIO IN NEW TAB}