DRAFT 4 / 14 / 07 JML 1 The Quest for Fairness : A case study of the evolution of Mexico ’ s Catastrophic Insurance Fund

In 2003, the Mexican government took a step toward greater parity in its health system. The stubbornly fragmented health sector remains fragmented, but a new health insurance program to fund basic preventive and curative services was created to cover nearly half of the population which had previously been without effective insurance coverage. The “Seguro Popular,” (SP) the medical care component of the System for Social Protection in Health, consisted of two insurance packages. The first, currently known as CAUSES (Catálogo Universal de Servicios Esenciales de Salud), covers services with relatively low costs and high incidence. The second is the Fund for Protection from Catastrophic Expenses (Fondo de Protección contra Gastos Catastróficos, FPGC), which covers a small list of diseases with lower incidence but high costs. As of mid-2006, SP covered 249 standard interventions through CAUSES and 6 through FPGC.