Colombia’s health system is slowly collapsing, while petro…

Bogotá – Presentation of the President’s Government, Gustavo PietroAnd the private sector, given the work of the health sector The battle is being fought on two fronts: on the one hand, in Congress, where it has reached the halfway point; On the other hand, in clinics and hospitals, where The regime is heading towards collapse because of its funding.

The battle in Congress

he The project presented by the Petro government managed to pass through the House of Representatives after about a year of discussion.

But one of the most difficult challenges remains, which is obtaining his approval in the Senate of the Republic, where the government’s allies constitute a minority, so it will have to negotiate with party legislators. The opposition and independent are the points that are considered the “backbone” of the reform project.

“From the Senate, we will do everything in our power to stop and sink health reform, but if it is approved, I will now declare a claim of unconstitutionality before the court, because in addition to being inconvenient, it is illegal,” the senator said. Miguel Uribe TorbaySenator from the Democratic Center.

In fact, there are such senators Humberto de la Calle, who, although they did not show their rejection of the project after the Chamber approved it, They have warned since the beginning of this year that the discussion should revolve around legal reform and not ordinary law as presented by the Petro government.

Juan Pablo Gallo, a senator from the Liberal Party, asked his political faction to reach a common position that would allow the progress of reform to be halted.

“The Liberal Party must take a unified stand against… To health reform that does not solve the suffering of Colombians. We’ve already seen it on camera, We are divided. “We must unite, vote against the project, and build real reform together,” Gallo said.

Day after day of battle

While the debate is being finalized in Congress, the daily life of the health sector is complicated by differences and executive funding of system actors.

Ana María Vesga, President of the Colombian Association of Medical Companies (ACEMI), stresses that “the truth is that the issue of financing They put a lot of pressure on her, and the conversation with the government became tense and what we are like He added: “We are waiting for them to finish paying because things are going, with or without reform, and without money there is no system.”

Doctors who prefer to remain anonymous and who work in public sector hospitals in Bogotá, told Bloomberg Linea that it appears that the government’s Plan A has become to strangle the system, and ACEMI’s Vesga, “They are calling for changes to be made through regulatory means,” he adds.

In fact, Vesga insists that the health reform still has 6 months of discussion in Congress, and warns that next year the UPC should receive a minimum increase, i.e. inflation plus 7 points.

Payment unit for Capitation (UPC) is the annual value recognized by each of the subsidiaries of the overall system Social Health Security (SGSSS) to cover compulsory health plan benefits (POS), in contributory and subsidized systems.

“We have provided some analysis to the Ministry, it very much depends on whether the benefit plan will have new inclusions, which changes the picture of the level of increase required by the UPC, but we talked about the need to increase the CPI +7 points to correct, because the government has shown That there is an accumulated loss due to inadequacy “From the UPC which led to the deterioration of EPS’s financial statements and therefore its assets,” says Vesga.

The ACEMI president insists that the sector’s financial situation has become complex on several fronts. “The government has obtained studies that show the accumulated deficit and the need to correct the problem by 2024, and added to that is the fact that they owe us financial resources. Maximum budgets for November and December The 2022 settlement has not been paid and when the problem of insufficient UPC is added to the cash problems due to the budgets not being transferred in a timely manner “To the maximum, because the problem is getting bigger, and if resources are not increased and are not allocated as they should be, we should have a different conversation with the government because in these circumstances it is very difficult.”

Finally, he concludes that with today’s conditions, earnings per share are at risk of interference, regardless of whether they are large or small.

“Earnings per share, both large and small, have seen their assets eroded, and cumulative losses by 2022 are approaching $6 billion. They have exposed their assets and eroded their technical reserves. The government sometimes feels that it is not taking seriously the risks that the sector is experiencing. It is a fact We could reach the level of losing the financial indicators and enablers where the health watchdog can They eventually have to intervene and it starts to be noticed by users as patronage and complaints increase and EPS is put in a stressful situation that can lead them to intervene.”

Complaints from doctors and patients

The defunding of the health system has become noticeable among those struggling to obtain treatment for expensive chronic diseases.

The doctor who works in one of the most famous clinics in the north of Bogotá confirms that by not paying dividends By not allowing medicines to patients, they are forcing them to pay for them out of their own pocket.

It started out by postponing non-vital surgeries, but as the process became more complicated in Congress, the doctor says, they stopped providing care and medications for high-cost diseases like cancer patients.

He explained that he preferred to stay It was not revealed to them that in the specific case of thyroid cancer, they stopped importing iodine for treatment Therefore, treatment that was given two or three months after surgery can now be delayed for 12 to 18 months.