If you are looking for Zurich life serious illness cover, Zurich's own name for it is critical illness cover: a lump sum paid when you are diagnosed with a listed condition that meets Zurich's definition. Its adviser-sold policy offers three levels of list, called Critical Illness, Critical Illness Enhanced and Critical Illness Enhanced Plus.

Whether a listed condition would pay for you turns on the exact wording, and answering the quick questions in this page's quote form lets an FCA-authorised broker call you without charge.

Which Zurich documents set out the cover?

Zurich's critical illness cover sits inside two policies. The Life Protection key features (February 2025, NP720500009 02/25) say you can apply for that policy online and describe one list; its age limits, exclusions and complaints route are on our Zurich life policy page.

The Enhanced levels appear in a second pair of documents, for the Zurich Personal Protection policy: key features (PW720494014 04/26) and terms and conditions (PW720480017 04/26), both published on Zurich's site for advisers; the key features say your adviser helps you decide and apply. Everything below comes from those two April 2026 documents, so it describes the adviser-sold policy, not every Zurich policy.

Full and Additional Payment conditions: what each level pays

A Full Payment condition pays the whole sum assured and the policy ends. An Additional Payment condition is less severe, pays a smaller amount, and the policy carries on unchanged.

LevelFull Payment conditionsAdditional Payment conditionsPaid for an Additional Payment condition
Critical Illness392The lower of £25,000 or 25% of the sum assured
Critical Illness EnhancedThe 39, plus an extra 13The 2, plus an extra 31The lower of £25,000 or 25% of the sum assured
Critical Illness Enhanced PlusAs EnhancedAs EnhancedThe lower of £50,000 or 50% of the sum assured, plus the Benefit Uplift

By our arithmetic that makes 52 Full Payment conditions and 33 Additional Payment conditions on Enhanced. Each upgrade is a policy option at extra cost, and Zurich's terms say Enhanced and Enhanced Plus can be added only at the start.

The Critical Illness Benefit Uplift is what sets Enhanced Plus apart. It applies when a life assured under age 55 is diagnosed with a critical illness meeting one of the 16 definitions in Zurich's Appendix 3 and survives for at least ten days. On a lump-sum policy Zurich then pays an extra amount on top of the sum assured, the lower of £200,000 or 100% of it, and the policy stops; Family Income Cover is worked out differently. In Zurich's own example, a 52-year-old with £300,000 of Life Cover and Critical Illness plus Enhanced Plus, diagnosed with Parkinson's disease with permanent symptoms, receives £500,000 in all and the policy ends.

Additional Payment claims follow their own rules. If one claim meets both a Full Payment and an Additional Payment definition at the same time, only the Full Payment claim is paid. The same Additional Payment condition cannot be claimed twice, but a different covered illness can lead to another claim, and on a joint policy both people can claim for the same one.

Curious what a given sum assured, with or without an upgrade, would cost at your age? Fill in the short form here and a broker can ring with a free quote. Settling on the amount itself is covered in how much critical illness cover you need.

The conditions on Zurich's standard and Enhanced lists

Depending on the entry, Zurich may pay at a specified severity, on diagnosis, or on a named treatment or surgery. The 39 Full Payment conditions are: aorta graft surgery; aplastic anaemia; bacterial meningitis; benign brain tumour; blindness; brain injury; cancer; cardiac arrest; cardiomyopathy; coma; coronary artery bypass graft; Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease; deafness; dementia including Alzheimer's disease; encephalitis; heart attack; heart surgery; heart-valve replacement or repair; interstitial lung disease; kidney failure; liver failure; loss of hand or foot; loss of speech; major organ transplant; motor neurone disease and specified diseases of the motor neurones; multiple sclerosis; paralysis of limb; Parkinson plus syndrome; Parkinson's disease; pneumonectomy; pulmonary artery replacement; pulmonary hypertension; removal of an eyeball as a result of injury or disease; respiratory failure; spinal stroke; stroke; systemic lupus erythematosus; terminal illness; and third-degree burns. The 2 Additional Payment conditions are less advanced cancer of the breast and less advanced cancer of the prostate.

Enhanced adds 13 Full Payment conditions: benign spinal cord tumour; brain abscess; cauda equina syndrome; heart failure; intensive care; mental health condition; necrotising fasciitis; neurodegenerative disorders not already covered; neuromyelitis optica (Devic's disease); peripheral vascular disease; primary sclerosing cholangitis; severe bowel disease; and syringomyelia or syringobulbia. Its 31 extra Additional Payment conditions include coronary angioplasty, permanent pacemaker or ICD insertion, severe sepsis, Diabetes Mellitus Type 1, Guillain-Barré syndrome, skin cancer, and less advanced cancers of the larynx, ovary, renal pelvis or ureter, testicle, urinary bladder and other sites. Each entry has its own definition; see kidney disease, mental health and conditions covered.

If a terminal diagnosis is part of why you are reading, Marie Curie offers free support by phone on 0800 090 2309, as well as online and in print.

What Zurich's cancer and heart attack wording requires

To meet the entry headed "Cancer – excluding less advanced cases", a malignant tumour has to be confirmed by histology (examination of tissue) and show malignant cells growing uncontrollably and invading tissue. Leukaemia, pseudomyxoma peritonei and Merkel cell cancer are counted, as are lymphoma and sarcoma unless they arise from and stay confined to the skin.

Excluded are cancers classed as pre-malignant, in situ, of borderline malignancy or of low malignant potential; prostate tumours below a Gleason score of 7 unless they reach a stated stage after removal of the prostate; urothelial, neuroendocrine and gastrointestinal stromal tumours below stated stages or grades; melanoma confined to the epidermis; and other skin cancer confined to the skin's layers. A cancer that misses the main entry may fit an Additional Payment entry, or none. See breast cancer, prostate cancer and cancer cover in general.

If cancer touches your life, Macmillan Cancer Support runs a helpline for cancer patients on 0808 808 00 00, Monday to Sunday, 8am to 8pm.

For "Heart attack – of specified severity", Zurich needs a definite diagnosis of acute myocardial infarction with death of heart muscle, shown by both a characteristic rise in cardiac enzymes or troponins and new ECG or diagnostic imaging changes; the evidence has to show a definite acute infarction. Angina, or myocardial injury, without an infarction is not covered. Other heart events have their own entries: cardiac arrest pays only "with insertion of a defibrillator", and a coronary artery bypass graft counts from the point you are put on the NHS waiting list for it on a consultant cardiologist's advice. The wider question is in does critical illness cover pay for a heart attack.

The ten-day rule and the evidence Zurich accepts

Zurich's terms pay Critical Illness Cover when a life assured is diagnosed with a covered illness and "survives for ten days". The same applies to Additional Payment and Benefit Uplift claims: a diagnosis that meets a definition pays nothing if the person dies within ten days.

Zurich won't pay if the life assured lives abroad and is not diagnosed in an accepted country. Medical certificates and examinations must come from a doctor in the UK, the European Union (member states as of 2021), Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland or the USA, though Zurich may accept evidence from elsewhere if it judges it comprehensive enough. Any extra exclusion that applies to you appears on your Confirmation of terms. Wider reasons a claim can fail are on the Zurich life policy page.

Children's Cover under Personal Protection

Children's Cover protects your children until their 22nd birthday. You choose a Children's Cover sum assured between £10,000 and £100,000. It is paid if a child is diagnosed with one of the 41 conditions in Zurich's Appendix 1 and survives ten days (or ten days after birth, if later). Children's Enhanced Cover adds the 44 conditions in Appendix 2 and Permanent Dependence, where a child will require lifelong medical attention and supervision. Zurich makes one Children's Critical Illness Cover payment per child, and your own policy continues after a children's claim.

Zurich will not pay where the cause or symptoms first arose before the child was covered, unless the child had already had a critical illness, finished treatment, been discharged from follow-up and had no treatment or advice for it in the last five years. Children's Cover also pays £5,000 if a child dies after they are 30 days old, and, for a hospital stay of seven or more nights in a row, £50 a night from the seventh night, limited to 30 nights per child over the policy term. The online Life Protection policy has a different children's benefit, set out on the Zurich life policy page.

Should you prefer to go through definitions like these with a person, completing the form here is a free way to have a broker call you; what Zurich accepts and charges stays with Zurich. Other insurers' wording, including Royal London, is under critical illness and income.

Frequently asked questions

Is serious illness cover the same as critical illness cover at Zurich?

Zurich's documents say critical illness. Serious Illness Cover is the name another insurer gives its own product, Vitality's, which pays on a different structure, so compare lists and definitions rather than names.

What was Zurich Critical Illness Select?

A Zurich quick reference guide for Business Protection (September 2023, NP721113005) describes a Critical Illness Select tier with an extra 10 Full Payment and 30 Additional Payment conditions. The April 2026 Personal Protection documents name Enhanced and Enhanced Plus, with different counts, and do not mention Select, so the two should not be treated as the same; ask an adviser which list a quote is based on.

Does Zurich pay out for a mental health condition?

Only the Enhanced levels list it, as a Full Payment condition. The definition needs a consultant psychiatrist's diagnosis and all of: at least 14 consecutive nights' treatment on a psychiatric ward (or 14 consecutive days of home care from a Crisis Resolution and Home Treatment Team, with at least two visits a day); chronic unremitting symptoms; no response to more than a year of supervised treatment; and an inability to do any paid work for at least one year. Conditions linked to or made worse by alcohol or drug abuse are excluded.

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