Breathe
By Barbara Anderson
On December 15, 2021, the federal government published the National Social Development Program 2021-2024. National Social Development Program 2021-2024. True to its six-year promise, this plan promised profound changes in poverty eradication and improvements in health coverage.
While recent the most recent data with which to compare 'promise with reality' are those published by the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development (CONEVAL) in August 2023 -accompanied by a controversy over the way in which the numbers were obtained-, the truth is that the commitment is half-hearted, or less than half-hearted.
Let's take it one step at a time.
The first point within the Priority Objectives was to lift 20 million Mexicans out of poverty. For Coneval, living in poverty means having at least one social deprivation (access to education, health, food, social security, housing quality and space, basic services) and having insufficient income to acquire the goods and services required to satisfy their food and non-food needs.
When the program was published, there were 43.9 million Mexicans in this condition. According to the latest data from Coneval, there are now 36.3 million, meaning that only 8.9 million people have been lifted out of poverty in the country.
How close are we to fulfilling the federal promise? To lift 11.1 million people out of poverty in the remainder of the year (at a rate of 1 million per month).
Another of the Priority Objectives to be met in 3 years was to bring to zero the percentage of Mexicans living in extreme poverty. Living in extreme poverty indicates that a person lives with three or more basic needs and their income is so low that if they use all of it to buy food, they do not consume the necessary nutrients.
At the time of the government's announcement, 8.5% of the population (8.7 million people) were in this condition. By 2022, the Program promised to lower the percentage to 5% and to zero in 2024.
How much progress is needed to fulfill this federal promise? This is where the least progress has been made because currently 7.1% of the population lives in extreme poverty. To eradicate it, to reach zero in this indicator, it is necessary in the next 11 months to remove 9.1 million people from this condition (an average of 827 thousand people per month).
To our health
Without reaching the promise of a Danish health system, what the National Social Development Program indicated in a table with interannual goals was that 100% of the population should have effective, universal and free access to medical and hospital care in order to also reduce to zero the percentage of the population with 'lack of health services'. Priority Objective 2 was: to guarantee the population effective, universal and free access to medical and hospital care, including the supply of medicines, healing materials and medical examinations, especially in the regions with the highest levels of marginalization.
This is where this improvement plan holds the most water.
At the time the plan was published, 28.2% of Mexicans did not have access to health care (35.7 million people) and currently the figure has risen to 39.1% of the population, which means that not only has the lack of health services not been eradicated, but almost 15 million people have been added to this deficiency.
How long until the government's promise is fulfilled? They have until December to provide health care to 50.4 million Mexicans (almost twice as many as when the Program was published). This data becomes more brutal when we look at other sector figures such as the increase in maternal mortality, a drop in national vaccination and the lack of access to medicines (another promise was that in 2014 100% of prescriptions were going to be filled by the government).
According to Inegi's Household Survey, people with the lowest income spend the highest percentage of their income on health: between 30% and 50%.
As the text of the National Development Program itself states, "in keeping with the guiding principle of the Mexican Government of 'Leave no one behind, leave no one out'", the current administration will surely begin in a few days turbo mode actions to reach the end of the six-year term with the goals related to poverty met with at least 20 million Mexicans out of poverty and extreme poverty, in addition to giving real access to health care to 50 million people.
Will the government succeed in the midst of a frantic electoral race to retain the presidency?
The opinions expressed are the responsibility of the authors and are absolutely independent of the position and editorial line of the company. Opinion 51.
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