One of the highest promises that Andrés Manuel López Obrador made before becoming president was to announce the disappearance of Seguro Popular. On several occasions, he complained, stating that “it was neither safe nor popular.” He also blamed him for causing a stagnation in the health of the population without social security in the country. Therefore, once in power, he completed the elimination of the program that emerged in 2003 and was replaced by the Institute of Health for Wellbeing (INSABI). More than a year after this new strategy was implemented, it is worth analyzing the changes and if one has really been different from the other.
In the first instance, one of the maximum accusations that at the time was made against Seguro Popular is that there was corruption within it. For this reason, it was stated that these types of practices that affect the prestige of the authorities would not be repeated.
Characteristics of each
For its part, one of the first differences between the two was the simplification of procedures. For the Seguro Popular it was necessary to affiliate and that implied a bureaucratic process. While with INSABI the registration is simpler and you only need to present CURP, INE or a birth certificate.
Now, although in theory both should be free in the end, it is not entirely true. Everything lies in the fact that INSABI services do have a cost. Even the Ministry of Health (SSa) had to publish a bulletin at the time to explain that third-level care does require payment by patients, while the rest are free.
In this sense, to avoid erroneous interpretations, the current authorities call recovery fees and non-payments for the provision of third-level services. Although at all times it has been pointed out that the figures are quite low.
Mexicans without health services increase
In addition to the above, today the former head of the SSa, Salomón Chertorivski, shared the most recent study of the National Center for Evaluation of Higher Education (Ceneval). Work measures poverty in the country and makes a comparative between 2018 and 2020. The most worrying thing is that there is a noticeable increase in the area of lack of access to health services.
Based on the research in 2018, there were 16.2 million Mexicans who lacked this elemental aspect for the life of any person. While by 2020 the figure increased to 28.2 million individuals. In this way, it is appreciated that now there are more people without basic health services.
It is alarming how the lack of health has grown, which is clearly due to the disappearance of Seguro Popular. This takes us back more than a decade. pic.twitter.com/VnqWVMCmZa
– Solomon Chertorivski (@Chertorivski) August 5, 2021
Another aspect that has always been criticized for Seguro Popular was the lack of medicines in the health units. Although it was said that this would change, in the end it has not been completely fulfilled. Within INSABI there have been constant complaints due to lack of drugs or delay in their delivery. The most notorious cases are those of children with cancer who have had their treatments interrupted.