9/3/2007
Health Insurance Coverage In Developing Countries

France will host, at President Chirac’s initiative, an international conference on March 15 and 16 entitled, “Health insurance coverage in developing countries: breaking the vicious cycle between sickness and poverty."

The international community has pursued resolute action against poverty and the major pandemics in the last few years, especially at the Millennium Summit in September 2000 which set several objectives concerning health issues.  At the same time a debate has started on improving health insurance coverage in developing countries.  It is known today that the health of people in developing countries will not improve significantly without at the same time consolidating their health system which requires a mechanism for health insurance coverage.

The G8 summit at Saint Petersburg in July 2006 encouraged “stepped-up discussion at the international level on practical approaches to the expansion of public, private and community-based health insurance coverage in developing countries.”   The high-level meeting in Paris is being held in the context of a controlled and humanized globalization. It will be attended by some 50 health ministers together with representatives of the main international organizations concerned (International Labor Organization, World Health Organization, World Bank, International Monetary Fund and OECD in particular), civil society and the private sector.