Mexico: 'The care we need "Seguro popular, increasing access to health care"

Since Mexico began covering breast cancer treatment for women who could not otherwise afford it, thousands of Mexican women have been diagnosed and treated on time, surviving the disease.

When Martha Alida Solórzano was first diagnosed with breast cancer, her reaction was anguish. But the sociologist and author of several books quickly turned her worry into diligence, searching the Web for information on the disease, her prospects, and how she should face this new challenge.When she told the private doctor she had been seeing that she could no longer afford to pay him, he suggested she go to the National Cancer Institute (INCAN), which has been providing free treatment for breast cancer to all Mexican women who need it since 2007.

The comprehensive treatment Solórzano has received is the direct result of Mexico’s national insurance program known as Seguro Popular (“Popular Insurance”), launched in 2003. The program guarantees access to an integrated package of health services to more than 50 million Mexicans—nearly half the population—who did not already have coverage under the country’s social security system.

Advancing toward universal coverage
In 2007, breast and cervical cancer were incorporated into Seguro Popular, followed soon by non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, testicular and prostate cancer, and bone marrow transplants. For children under 18, all tumors and neoplasms are covered.

Seguro Popular has taken Mexico a huge step forward in its efforts to reach universal health coverage, that is, to ensure social protection in health to the entire population regardless of employment status or ability to pay.

Before Seguro Popular, one in three breast cancer patients dropped out of treatment for lack of economic resources. Today only about 1% of our patients abandons treatment and for reasons that have nothing to do with cost. Some 25,000 new breast cancer cases are diagnosed in Mexico each year.
Mexico’s national health budget quintupled over 10 years and that the challenge for the new system—which has achieved nearly universal affiliation—is to guarantee effective access to timely and quality services.

Universal health coverage “is the road to take if we want everyone to have access to the health services they need, with quality and without fear of not being able to pay for treatment that can save their lives,” said the Director of the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO), Carissa F. Etienne. “There is no single path” to achieve universal coverage, “but each country can do something to advance” toward this goal, she said, noting that PAHO/WHO is working with its member countries to advance universal coverage.