Curative Flips the Deductible Model with Launch of Innovative Zero First Health Plan

Curative has introduced Zero First, a health insurance plan that eliminates the traditional upfront deductible in favor of an "insurer-pays-first" model. For brokers and employer groups, this represents a significant shift in benefit design, aiming to remove financial barriers to routine care while managing the total cost of ownership for level-funded plans.

What was announced

Curative has launched Zero First, a health insurance plan designed to eliminate the traditional upfront deductible. In a reversal of the standard industry model, the plan pays for eligible care in full up to a specified amount before the member begins sharing costs. This structure is intended to ensure that members can access routine and essential services without immediate out-of-pocket expenses.

The plan maintains $0 cost-sharing for several essential services throughout the year, including preventive care, primary care, telehealth, urgent care, and outpatient behavioral health and substance use services. For more extensive care, such as specialist visits, diagnostic testing, imaging, and hospital stays, the plan pays first until a set threshold is reached.

Two primary designs are available:

• Zero First EPO: The plan covers the first $2,500 of eligible in-network care. Members then pay 30% of additional expenses up to an $8,000 individual out-of-pocket maximum.
• Zero First PPO: The plan covers the first $5,000 of eligible in-network care. Subsequent expenses are shared at a 25% rate, with a $6,350 individual out-of-pocket maximum.

Zero First is available to eligible level-funded employer groups with effective dates starting December 1, 2026. It joins Curative’s existing portfolio, which includes the rebranded Zero Always plan that continues to offer $0 cost-sharing for covered in-network care when plan requirements are met.

The companies involved

Curative is a health insurance company that focuses on restructuring the relationship between employers, employees, and their healthcare coverage. The organization operates with a mandate to challenge traditional insurance structures, specifically targeting the financial barriers that often lead members to delay or avoid necessary medical care. By positioning itself as an alternative to the established carrier model, Curative aims to provide more transparent and accessible benefits designs.

The company primarily serves the employer-sponsored insurance market, with a particular emphasis on level-funded groups. Level-funding is a hybrid approach that combines the cost-saving potential of self-insurance with the financial predictability of a fully insured plan, making it a popular choice for mid-sized organizations. Curative’s portfolio now includes the newly launched Zero First plan alongside its existing offering, which has been rebranded as Zero Always. This existing plan continues to provide $0 cost-sharing for covered in-network medical care, provided that specific plan requirements are met by the members. Through these offerings, Curative seeks to provide brokers and employers with more flexible options for managing rising benefit costs.

What this means from an insurtech perspective

From an underwriting perspective, flipping the deductible model represents a significant shift in how risk is managed and priced. Traditional carriers rely on deductibles to suppress utilization and shift initial costs to the member, but this often leads to deferred care and higher long-term claims costs. By assuming "first-dollar" liability, Curative is betting that early intervention will improve loss ratios over time. This puts pressure on incumbent vendors and legacy core systems that are often hard-coded for traditional deductible-first logic. For brokers, this provides a differentiated product in a crowded level-funded market, though it raises questions about how reinsurers will price stop-loss coverage for such a non-traditional risk profile.