2023-04-28 20:00:53
- Currently, it is estimated that 50% of the Mexican population in the informal sector does not have rights and is the poorest.
- Various UNAM specialists agreed that Mexico lacks sufficient resources to achieve a universal health system.
- One of the problems is the segmentation of Institutions, so the IMSS and ISSSTE must think of a different form of financing.
One of the greatest desires of our country is to achieve a universal health system. But although actions have been taken for years to achieve this, to date it has not been possible. For this reason, it is a pending task and now the most important thing is to determine if it is feasible in the short term.
In this case, experts from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) agreed that it is desirable to have a national public health system integrated, which will have to be paid for in the medium term with fiscal resources. To finance it, you have to think about an urgent tax reform, interesting, ingenious, where there may even be state and municipal taxes.
“Mexico does not have the resources to achieve a universal health system”
In the First International Colloquium: Threatened Humanity, Who is in Charge of the Future?, organized by the UNAM University Government Program and the Institute of Democratic Governance of Spain, Arantxa Colchero Aragonés, researcher at the National Institute of Public Health, He said that the health system in Mexico does not have sufficient resources to guarantee effective and quality coverage for the poorest population, and the challenge increased with the pandemic.
He pointed out that, from its origin, it has been fragmented in terms of financing; Institutions such as the IMSS and ISSSTE have a different way of financing themselves, the provision is different, as is the quality, and with great heterogeneity throughout the national territory. But the most serious thing is that 50 percent of the population in the informal sector does not have rights and is the poorest.
When answering the question of who should be in charge of strengthening it and reducing inequalities of access, he considered that the government, which should also expand public policies for the prevention (screening, campaigns, etc.) of chronic diseases, and regulation based on frameworks of reference built at a global level that promote planetary health.
In the session dedicated to the topic Inequality, financing and public policies for development -coordinated by the director of the Faculty of Economics (FE), Eduardo Vega López- the General Secretary of the UNAM, Leonardo Lomelí Vanegas, said that the segmentation in the public health system is reflected in an additional mechanism of widening inequality.
He also indicated that given the stagnation of employment in the formal sector, there has been an effort to promote financing mechanisms for the attention of the population, such as the Popular insurancebut neither was it accompanied by a systematic policy of analysis where the existing care offer had to be expanded.
The lack of health protection constitutes a risk factor for falling into situations of poverty. That is one of the great priorities of the country and one of the fundamental reforms that we should have undertaken a long time ago.
#BoletínUNAM Tax reform is urgent to have an integrated public health system > https://t.co/9qZDAiREFP pic.twitter.com/NnxSWOgQ89
— UNAM Press Room (@SalaPrensaUNAM) April 28, 2023
Victoria Nuguer, a researcher at the Research Department of the Inter-American Development Bank, explained that the Latin American and Caribbean region faces a triple challenge. The first is social, consisting of reversing the growing trends of poverty, inequality and food insecurity.
Also, the fiscal challenge and the need for reforms to overcome social challenges; and that of growth, since before the pandemic the region had low levels of economic growth, an average of two percent. And to these challenges are added others: climate change, diversity and inclusion, and the rule of law.
Therefore, he proposed a policy agenda to address these challenges in the short term, which includes strategies to control inflation and protect the credibility of monetary policy; and the implementation and strengthening of targeted subsidies to protect the most vulnerable; and in the medium and long terms, adopt fiscal reforms and institutions for more efficient spending and progressive tax systems, as well as design policies and institutions to promote productivity growth.
When speaking, Rolando Cordera Campos, emeritus professor at FE, mentioned that we need a universal public health care system that includes prevention. “The current system of public and private financing is not enough.” As a society we must assume health as a human right, but also as a responsibility of all, individually and collectively, and from that perspective, propose a reform.
This must begin with the tax aspect, which responds to criteria of distributive equity and tax urgency, which in effect give the Mexican State, in its different government bodies, real, effective capacities to consistently and daily attend to the majority claim. of health.
Meanwhile, Carlos Urzúa Macías, national researcher and member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences, argued that public health and education are the best way to redistribute well-being for each of the Mexicans.
Was Seguro Popular better than Insabi?
He recalled that Seguro Popular had a great advantage: health services were provided by state systems in the matter, hospitals and clinics in each state, and the federal government financed those services. However, universality never happened.
In this six-year term, a radical change was decided; create the Institute of Health for Well-being. It was intended to centralize spending again, from the purchase of medicines to the payment of the payroll. It didn’t work at all because it was badly designed and the pandemic came. Now, the government has leaned towards the IMSS Bienestar, designed to serve the poorest, which seems like a better idea.
Also read:
5 countries that already have a universal health system
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At the end of the six-year term, Mexico will have a single, public and universal health system
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