Explain which insurance premiums MediSave pays and how much of a shield plan premium it covers.
Open your CPF transaction history, go to your MediSave account, and pick out every deduction from the past year that was not a hospital or clinic bill. Premium deductions are listed in that section alongside hospital and clinic bills, so they are easy to miss. Most people have at least one premium deducted from MediSave without having thought about it.
MediShield Life is basic health insurance that lasts for life and covers every Singapore citizen and permanent resident. MediSave can pay its premium in full, and for most people it does. The premium is deducted from MediSave automatically each year, and you don't need to do anything.
CareShield Life is long-term care insurance for severe disability. MediSave can pay the whole CareShield Life premium for people covered by it. Some older members are still on ElderShield, the older scheme that CareShield Life replaced. MediSave can pay ElderShield premiums too. The CareShield Life website lists who is covered by which scheme and the current premiums.
An Integrated Shield plan is a private insurer's plan layered on top of MediShield Life. It adds cover for higher ward classes or private hospitals. Its premium has two parts: the MediShield Life part, and the private part that pays for the additional cover.
MediSave pays the whole MediShield Life part. MediSave can pay the private part only up to a yearly cap, and the cap depends on your age. Anything above the cap must be paid in cash. You can get the current cap for your age band from the CPF Board or MOH (Ministry of Health).
At older ages, premiums rise faster than the MediSave cap. So the cash portion of an Integrated Shield plan usually grows with age, even if the total looks affordable now. Read your insurer's premium table for the ages ahead of you as well as for this year.
Many people hold a rider on their Integrated Shield plan. A rider reduces what you pay yourself when you make a claim. From 1 April 2026, new riders sold can no longer cover the minimum Integrated Shield plan deductible set by MOH, so if your rider was bought from that date you still pay that deductible yourself. MOH sets out the current rules for riders. MediSave cannot pay any part of a rider premium, so riders are paid entirely in cash.
Rider premiums rise sharply with age, and in later life riders become one of the largest cash costs of health insurance. Many people only notice how much the rider costs when the renewal notice arrives. Insurance Decoded, lesson 4.4, "Premiums at 30, 50 and 70: can you keep paying", covers whether a rider is still worth keeping at each age.
Linda (an invented example, and all her figures are invented) has MediShield Life, an Integrated Shield plan, CareShield Life and a rider. Each year near her birthday month, about S$1,500 leaves her MediSave in one deduction, and her insurer charges her credit card. For years she did not connect the two charges, and she always said her health insurance was "paid by CPF".
When she read her renewal notice carefully, she found that MediSave was paying three separate premiums. Her MediShield Life premium was S$560, paid from MediSave. The private part of her Integrated Shield plan was S$900. The MediSave limit for her age band was S$700 (a made-up figure), so MediSave paid S$700 and she paid S$900 - S$700 = S$200 in cash. Her CareShield Life premium was S$300, paid from MediSave. She also found a rider she had forgotten about, costing S$450 and paid fully in cash.
Added up, MediSave paid S$560 + S$700 + S$300 = S$1,560 a year. She paid S$200 + S$450 = S$650 a year in cash, and that money came from her take-home pay.
To split your own premiums the same way, go through them in this order:
Put the MediShield Life part of your Integrated Shield plan under MediSave, in full. Compare the private insurer's part against the MediSave limit for your age band. Put the amount within the limit under MediSave and any amount above it under cash. Put the whole rider premium under cash. Add MediShield Life, the MediSave share of the private part, and CareShield Life or ElderShield to get what MediSave pays each year. Add the cash share of the private part and the rider to get what you pay in cash each year.
Rising premiums use up your MediSave as well as your cash. During your working years, MediSave contributions are normally higher than your premiums, so the balance grows or overflows. When you stop work, contributions stop. Premiums continue and keep rising with age. For a retiree, premiums plus any medical bills can eventually come to more than the interest MediSave earns, and from then on the balance goes down.
None of this is a reason to drop cover, but it is a reason to know your own figures. In Lesson 5.4, "List what your MediSave pays each year", you build a list that shows when your own MediSave might start to shrink. If you plan to stop work early, Financial independence: planning the number and the path, lesson 7.2, "Premiums rise with age", deals with the same issue.
To build your own list, you need two sources. Your CPF transaction history shows every premium paid from your MediSave each year. Your insurer's renewal notice or app shows the cash part of any shield plan or rider. Have both open before you start the list.
Write down every premium your MediSave pays each year, and the cash you pay for any shield plan or rider.
Junxiong-WFG Organisation is an authorised representative of AIA Financial Advisers Private Limited (Reg. No. 201715016G).