President Andrés Manuel López Obrador accepted this Wednesday, July 10, that the strategy in the operation of the Institute of Health for Well-being failed (Insabi), created at the beginning of his government to replace Seguro Popular, but he noted that with IMSS Bienestar they resumed the original project.
At his morning press conference, National PalaceThe president also acknowledged that in the case of the state news agency, he also failed because there was a lack of attention and dialogue on the part of his government.
López Obrador explained that his government strategy generally worked because it has some basic guidelines.
Everything related to administration, of course, the first thing is to not allow corruption, not to allow luxury in the government, that was fundamental, that was the key, that was what allowed us to free up funds for development, that is the formula, explained the Tabasco native.
“In the case of health, what we had planned did not work. From the beginning we had planned the IMSS Bienestar,” said the head of the Executive, who explained what was the basis of that project.
He said that in 1980, a group of young people took charge of supporting indigenous Mayan Chontal communities and did important things, such as a comprehensive program and transport cooperatives, as well as a livestock credit plan.
He mentioned that at that time the National Plan for Depressed Areas and Marginalized Groups (COPLAMAR) was created, but during the government of Ernesto Zedillo it was decided to decentralize the health system, and health funds were given to state governments, as is the case with education.
That did not work at all, he added, and a Health Secretary opposed the inclusion in decentralization of what was initially IMSS COPLAMARand it was the only thing that remained decentralized in the sector.
“That is what we are going to do in the country, we are going to federalize again, so that it is not just the federation that gives the money to the states,” López Obrador stressed.
“Seguro Popular was neither safe nor popular, it was about giving money to the states, and the states sometimes managed these funds very well, and there were medicines and the health centers and hospitals worked, but in other cases they used that money for other activities, and completely abandoned the health system.”
The President said that there was a lot of resistance when the Insabi model was projected for the health system and to replace Seguro Popular.
“So we made the decision to create Insabi, seeking to resolve the issue, but those at Insabi, in addition to inertia, led us to end up doing the same thing, giving the funds to the states,” said López Obrador.
Yes, there was progress because with Insabi we managed to make it possible to buy medicines abroad, because they had a very juicy business, a few, they had so much power that medicines could not be bought abroad, the law did not allow it, he added.
“We had to change the law to buy medicines anywhere in the world. It was a monopoly. They controlled the purchase of medicines for the benefit of 10 companies that were not even laboratories, they were Latinus-type companies,” he said.
“That’s why when we decided to buy medicines abroad and it turned out that 10 companies were selling 70 percent of all medicines to the government, they came after us. The whole onslaught was very strong, it was also very painful, because they also had control of all the mixtures that are made to fight cancer.”
Then they accused us of not giving cancer medicines to children, added López Obrador, we endured, we resisted and that’s it, and Insabi served that purpose and other things, but it was not what we were originally thinking of.
Once the pandemic is over, we will return to the original model, that is, federalizing health services, the head of the Executive commented.
And the governors, in a responsible manner, decided to return all the real estate that the federation had given them and that they had built with state funds to federalize the health system. Now it is a single system, with 11 thousand health centers and more than 600 second and third level hospitals, he stressed.
“In September we are going to raise white flags, because we will have them in 24 states,” he said.
López Obrador admitted that in the case of Insabi “we had an administrative mishap, it was corrected and we are moving forward”
Notimex
In the case of Notimex, he said there was a lack of dialogue and more attention from the government. “Because it is important to have a government agency,” he said.
“It is supplemented by what is done with the management of public media, but it is not the same. However, the confrontation had already started and it was not possible. Perhaps we lacked more dedication, more dialogue.”
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