The Colombian health system spent more than what they received for each affiliate in 2024. This was warned on Thursday by the Colombian Association of Comprehensive Medicine Companies (ACEMI) during the third technical analysis session convened by the Ministry of Health to review the Capitation Payment Unit (UPC), as ordered by the Constitutional Court.
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The day, focused on the accident component, presented a worrying panorama for the system’s financial sustainability. “The incident of the UPC has come in sustained deterioration”, Said Acemi in his presentation.
This indicator, which relates the income received by the EPS through the UPC with the costs incurred to serve their affiliates, reached a 109.5% level in 2024. In practical terms, this means that “for every 100 pesos that the EPS received for UPC, they had to pay 109.5 pesos in health services.”
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The budget lag only for that year amounts to $ 5.95 billion, not counting the $ 5.2 billion administrative expenditure registered in the same period. The situation is aggravated because the figures do not include the financial information of the new EPS, which has not delivered its financial statements by 2024. “It is possible that the real deficit is even greater”, Warned the association.
UPC accidents
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Acemi also warned about the consequences of this phenomenon. According to its estimates, the accumulation of accidents in recent years has generated an actuarial debt of the Nation with the health system that is between 1.5% and 1.8% of GDP, that is, between $ 26.3 and $ 33 billion.
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“A system whose resources do not grow to the rhythm of the population’s health demands is condemned to register increasing accidents”, Said the organization, which recalled that the health sector budget has not increased as a proportion of GDP since 2017, except for the extraordinary resources assigned during the Covid-19 Pandemia.
Financial consequences are reflected in other key indicators. The deterioration of EPS’s assets has caused “The barefoot of the investment of technical reserves, the general decapitalization of the system and the increase in portfolios between the different actors”
(Read: Health requires structural and concerted actions, warns the Andi)
UPC accidents
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In addition to the technical diagnosis, ACEMI called the Ministry of Health to improve the operational conditions of the technical tables. Among other things, requested the timely and complete delivery of the databases, minutes and analysis documents; more time for the development of sessions; and the use of audiovisual tools that facilitate the exposure of graphic and numerical content. He also requested that the presentations of the Ministry “remain in the technical level” and avoid value judgments or accusations towards the actors of the system.
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The association filed a technical document at the table on which the conclusions presented this Thursday supports. That text, he explained, constitutes the support of his analysis of the evolution of the accident rate in recent years. The Ministry of Health plans to make two more sessions within the framework of this review table. The next one will take place after Holy Week.
