Almost half of the population of the suburbs only has the coverage of the public hospital

Ismael Bermudez

05/18/2021 10:09

• Clarín.com

• Economy

Updated 05/18/2021 10:09

Due to the fall in employment, the increase in labor informality, the rise in unemployment,

and almost half of the population that lives in the Buenos Aires suburbs only has the coverage of the public hospital

.

There are

5.5 million people, 1.5 million more than at the end of 2017,

who for different reasons lost coverage of the social work, the mutual,

the emergency services or the prepaid.

In the Greater Buenos Aires, 44.6% of the population does not have private health coverage

and depends on the provision of state services.

In 2017, it was 33.9%

.

Within the public subsector, health in the suburban municipalities is provided by provincial and national municipal health establishments.

“

Compared to 2019, municipal health spending per capita has increased nominally by 25% in 2020

, on average, in the region.

On the other hand, if the effect of inflation is considered (which was 32.3% in Greater Buenos Aires during 2020), said spending registers a real fall of the order of 5% ”, says a report from the National University of General Sarmiento.

The increase in public coverage, in a context aggravated by the pandemic, occurred for several reasons.

Part of it because he lost his job in the last 3 years.

Unemployment added 251,000 more people, totaling 762,000 unemployed.

Also, many people who had registered jobs lost their social work coverage

.

Others,

due to the loss of income

, could not sustain their affiliation to prepaid or switched to less expensive plans.

And finally a sector got informal jobs, freelancers, without medical coverage.

And that is why underemployment increased by 326,000 more people, totaling 975,000.

This adverse labor outlook aggravated the strong economic-social deterioration in the most populated region of the country,

with 6.3 million poor people, 80% more than in 2017

. These numbers contemplate the aid of the State. Otherwise,

poverty would exceed 7 million people.

An example.

The IFE

that was paid last year, and was discontinued this year,

covered almost 2 million people or families in the suburbs

.

"61.7% of the beneficiaries correspond to informal workers

, mostly men; while 2.1% correspond to workers in private homes and 27% to AUH, these two categories being predominantly female", according to the "Radiography of the Social Assistance in the suburbs ”from the Observatorio del Conurbano.

According to an ANSeS report, “the majority of the beneficiary population reached by the IFE in the Province of Buenos Aires

does not have the possibility of accessing a formal job as a consequence of a structural problem.

To evaluate this, the employment insertion in relation of dependency of the beneficiaries of the IFE in the year immediately prior to the one used to carry out the crossings (February 2020) was analyzed. In this regard, it

was observed that only 312,283 beneficiaries (9.7%) had at least one month of work

in a formal dependency relationship in the period February 2019 to January 2020. By extending the period of analysis to the last four years, observe that

only 794,197 beneficiaries (24.7%), that is, only one out of every four beneficiaries, had a formal job

in the period February 2016 to January 2020 ”.

In relation to the socioeconomic impact, the Report estimates that

the IFE prevented almost 500,000 of the suburbs from falling into indigence and 800,000 into poverty.

The latest INDEC data says that, despite social assistance,

in the suburbs 72.7% of girls and boys under 14 years old live in poor households

.

The bulk of these minors is only covered by the public system.

YN

Look also

Due to the crisis, three million people left social and prepaid works and are treated only in public hospitals