As insurers start counting the cost of devastating floods across central Europe, many of the region's businesses and households are not covered and will have to foot the bill themselves.
Nicolaus von Bomhard, chief executive of the world's largest reinsurer Munich Re, attributed under-insurance for flood risk in the worst affected areas to a legacy of insurers' past reluctance to offer services in the region.
While this has changed and insurers are now prepared to insure almost all the risk, under-insurance remains a problem in the region, he said.
"On the losses, I can't give any numbers, it's way too early, but the macroeconomic loss will be much bigger than the insured loss," he said at an insurance industry news conference on how insurers and governments could work to reduce the impact of natural disasters.
But while waters were still rising and thousands of Germans, Hungarians and Czechs were evacuating their homes, some industry specialists said they expect the insurance loss to fall short of the last big floods to hit the region in 2002
Read more: Europe's insurers seen escaping brunt of flood damage | Reuters
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