PHM-Exch> Universal health coverage: does anything go? No

[Claudio Schuftan]

From: Ruggiero, Mrs. Ana Lucia (WDC) <ruglucia at paho.org>
crossposted from: EQUIDAD at listserv.paho.org


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*Universal health coverage: does anything go? No

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Joseph Kutzin - World Health Organization, ****Geneva**, **Switzerland****.*
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Published online: 10 October 2012
*Bulletin of the World Health Organization - Article ID: BLT.12.113654

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Available online at: http://bit.ly/RmhYq7

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“…….In its World health report 2010,1 the World Health Organization noted
that there is no single, best path for reforming health financing
arrangements to move systems closer to universal health coverage, i.e. to
improve access to needed, effective services while protecting users from
financial ruin. However, this lack of a blueprint for health financing
reforms was not meant to convey the message that “anything goes” on the
path to universal health coverage. Indeed, concerns have been raised that
some reforms, often implemented in the name of expanding coverage, may
actually compromise equity.2 Theory and country experience yield important
lessons on both promising directions and pitfalls to avoid.****


Interpretation of health financing reform experience requires getting
beneath commonly used labels such as “tax-funded systems” or “social health
insurance”, or simply even “health insurance”, which was used as the basis
for a systematic review published in the September issue of the
Bulletin<http://bit.ly/OYTW8K>
.****

Such labels hide more than they illuminate, as shown by emerging evidence
on reforms that increase access and financial protection but are funded
predominantly from general tax revenues (e.g. **Mexico**, **Kyrgyzstan**, **
Rwanda**, ****Thailand****).****


Deriving meaningful lessons from innovative reform experiences requires a
deeper understanding of how countries have altered their funding sources,
pooling arrangements, purchasing methods, and policies on benefits and
patient cost-sharing. All systems, regardless of what they are called, have
to address these functions and policy choices….”

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