By: Staff Writer
October 25, 2024
The United Nations’ Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) along with the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said in a recent report that post-pandemic there remains “significant structural weaknesses, marked by chronic underfunding,” in the regional healthcare system.
ECLAC and PAHO, in a report titled, “The urgency of investing in health systems in Latin America and the Caribbean to reduce inequality and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals,” said: “The health systems of Latin American and Caribbean countries have significant structural weaknesses, marked by chronic underfunding coupled with high out-of-pocket costs, fragmentation in the provision of services and segmentation of patients according to their ability to pay. There are also challenges linked to institutional capacity and governance that limit their ability to respond to public health challenges. This has resulted in deep inequalities that compromise universal access to health and well-being, as well as financial protections for households.”
It added: “The COVID-19 pandemic triggered a profound health, social and economic crisis in Latin America and the Caribbean, reflected in increased levels of unemployment and labour informality, higher rates of poverty, extreme poverty and inequality, and the widening of existing education gaps. In addition, the pandemic caused a displacement effect and prolonged interruption of essential health services, increasing access barriers and excess mortality rates and causing significant setbacks in key dimensions of health such as immunization coverage and food security, with lingering impacts in the region.”
The document warns of the urgency of investing in this area to reduce inequality and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), with only six years to go before the targets are met.
This will be the third publication by both UN institutions, following those made in 2020 and 2021 to analyze the impacts of Covid-19.
The multiple challenges inherited from the pandemic, together with the development crisis in the region, caused significant setbacks in the SDGs and in key health indicators, warned an ECLAC communiqué.
Both the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean and PAHO recommend carrying out reforms to guarantee timely and quality access to health care and strengthen institutional capacity to respond to current and future health emergencies.
They also consider it necessary to increase public investment in this sector to at least six percent of Gross Domestic Product and, of this figure, to direct 30 percent to primary health care.
ECLAC points out that with little time left to achieve the UN’s 2030 Agenda, it is urgent to implement effective measures that allow recovering lost progress and resuming the sustainable development agenda.