Could new cancer tests make you uninsurable? Science can now provide far more information about risks we face throughout our lives. Patients with cancer markers discovered in the recent study are up to 50pc more likely to develop prostate cancer than the rest of the population, while those with markers for breast cancer are 30pc more likely to develop the disease. For obvious reasons, information like this is a powerful tool. You may wish to know whether you are likely to develop a disease so you can be regularly screened or receive preventive treatment. You might also wish to take out insurance to protect your family if you become unwell. However, the insurance industry is as information-hungry as you are, which raises the question of whether genetic testing could make you uninsurable. Fortunately, there is protection in place for those who take genetic tests, although it is complicated. The grandly titled Concordat & Moratorium on Genetics & Insurance gives insurers limited rights on test results they can ask for. The concordat is designed to allow people "to take out substantial amounts of cover without having to disclose the results of predictive genetic tests." The flip side of this is that insurance companies want fair rights of access to "relevant information ... to enable fair assessment and risk pricing in the interest of all past, present and future customers." In short, the concordat means you must disclose some information, but not all. Crucial to this point is the difference between predictive and diagnostic testing. If you fear you may be at risk of a genetic disease but do not have any symptoms, and have a test, you do not have to disclose this to an insurer when you are asking for life cover or a critical illness policy. The one exception to this is Huntington's disease, where you must disclose a positive test if you are buying life cover worth more than £500,000. If you have symptoms of a disease and take a test because of this, the test is described as diagnostic, and in this case you have to disclose it. However, experts point out that there are some cases where you may wish to point out a negative genetic test to an insurer. Malcolm Tarling of the Association of British Insurers said insurers had the right to ask you about your family history. So if there is a history of breast or prostate cancer in the family and a new predictive test based on this month's results suggests that you are not at risk, telling your insurer may decrease your premiums. New rules in force from today and discussed on our front page aim to give customers more protection over the information they give to insurers. This means that, unless they ask you a question about something in your family history, you should not be penalised for not disclosing it unless you "carelessly or deliberately lied or misrepresented your circumstances." There is also one area where ill health can be financially beneficial. When you buy an annuity with your pension pot, the insurer weighs up how long you will live. If you are eligible for an "impaired life" - or "enhanced" - annuity, you will get more money every year. A spokesman for annuity experts Partnership said that in some cases predictive genetic testing or family history might already be taken into account when an annuity quote is given, and that in the future this could become more common. Another area becoming ever more personalised is car insurance. Insurers used to be allowed to predict how well people would drive by using their sex as well as their age. Now, the EU does not allow gender to come into it, which has pushed up premiums for young female drivers, who used to be seen as lower risk. The result is a rise in the number of "telematics boxes," which are about as Big Brother as it gets. These boxes monitor your every driving move, which can bring down prices considerably. On the other hand, if you are a bad driver or break an insurer-imposed curfew, telematics can become very expensive indeed.