06. December 2020

Tobacco use remains one of the most important risk factors for developing serious conditions such as heart disease, lung disease, and cancer. Due to its influence on health, underwriting places significant value on identifying tobacco exposure among life insurance applicants. Accordingly, the life insurance industry widely screens for tobacco use by testing with the biomarker cotinine, a metabolite of nicotine, in an applicant’s clinical chemistry panel. The challenge with measuring cotinine...