When your life insurance gets sick

New York

LIKE clockwork, Sara and James Cook paid US$452 a month for life insurance. That is, until a letter arrived last year telling the elderly Georgia couple the premiums on the policy they'd had for 25 years were rising sharply.

They held a universal life policy, a popular type that includes an investment account that accumulates cash when interest rates are high. But with rates at historic lows, it was being drained - quickly.