During these times of global meltdowns and internal conflicts affecting Mexico, the declaration of universal healthcare comes as a silver lining in a dark cloud. Based on a PBC.com report, the annual budget for the total healthcare plan in Mexico is estimated to be about forty billion US Dollars. Salomon Chertorivski, Mexico’s newest health minister talked about the Seguro Popular healthcare coverage plan. Seguro Popular or ‘popular insurance’ is aimed at providing financial assistance for medical care to Mexican citizens.

This form of mexico health care plan is advancing in a very impressive way, as over 50 million citizens have already registered for Seguro Popular. If this direction keeps up, the health ministry is convinced that by December 2011, it will reach universal coverage, i.e. financial help for medical treatment to every single citizen of Mexico. It was determined that about 50% of the people in Mexico were without any sort of health insurance coverage for medical emergencies. Only citizens with secure jobs had some form of financial help to meet medical costs. But with the launch of Seguro Popular, Mexico health care is going to be offered to everyone.  

Challenges faced by the health ministry

There have been a variety of challenges faced by the government in the 14 month long process of arranging and designing this insurance coverage and achieving universal coverage. The initial challenge presented was the quality of medical care provided in all hospitals in mexico. Standardizing this quality of care by bettering infrastructure and providing necessary professional medical services was initiated by constructing more than a thousand centers and hospitals all over the country. The second difficulty to overcome was to provide sufficient preventive medical care to decrease the chances of contracting major illnesses brought on by neglect or insufficient amenities.

Services and coverage under Seguro Popular

The Seguro Popular program will take care of all costs for first aid like consulting a doctor for minor injuries, allergies or diseases, as well as include the cost for medication. Approximately 95% of occasions where the patient has to spend a night in the hospital will be covered. Routine procedures like appendicitis or child birth will also be covered with the secondary care insurance. All sorts of terminal illnesses including cancer are going to be completely covered for patients who are under the age of 18. All healthcare costs required to treat children younger than five will be taken care of by the Seguro Popular plan. All HIV affiliated procedures are also part of the coverage. This is without a doubt a very competitive health coverage plan that can make mexico living a lot more appealing to foreigners attempting to relocate to this spectacular destination.

Universal coverage vs. global recession

The Mexican government is approaching medical care as an investment rather than an expense. By committing to better medical care programs for citizens, Mexico can plug some of the holes so far as financial instabilities are concerned. Salomon also announced that the citizens will continue paying taxes in order to keep the healthcare services. The switch from curative to preventive medical care is also considered to be critical and also favorable in the long term.

Due to the current housing crisis, a great number of Americans who need to move into retirement or assisted living facilities are stranded in their own homes, unable to sell them. This is one of greatest problems of the recession and seniors are no exception.

According to many independent studies, residency rates for independent and assisted facilities have significantly dropped about 2%, although some facilities in certain hard hit areas have a vacancy rate as high as 20 or 30%. Some facilities, seeing their waiting lists vacancy rates fluctuate, have hired real estate agents to assist potential residents in selling their current homes.

Statistics are showing that the housing market’s collapse is putting an unsettling amount of Americans in the terrible position of having to choose between paying their housing bills or paying their healthcare bills. For people to borrow against their homes to help manage other bills is nothing new, but with home values declining and interest rates skyrocketing, some patients who find themselves in debt are now at the risk of losing their homes because of the overwhelming cost of medical bills. Some are even dropping their healthcare altogether just to hang on to their homes.

Making an accurate depiction of how many people are being forced to choose between their mortgage payments and their medical bills can prove to be a difficult task. However, some financial institutions are claiming that medical issues are becoming an increasing reason why some people are beginning to fall behind on their financial obligations.

Most financial experts agree that urging people to refinance a mortgage or use their home equity to pay off medical bills is not the best route to take. If a hospital or medical provider wants to put a lien on a patient’s home, they must first obtain a court order and generally do not receive payment until after the home has been sold. At any rate, hospitals are often reluctant to use strategies such as this for fear of bad publicity.

Assisted living marketing services are provided by 800seniors.com a leading referral system in the assisted living industry. For more information, call 1-800-768-8221. Sky Palma is a freelance staff writer