Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Day 2024 focuses on the role of financial protection in accelerating progress towards UHC. Financial protection ensures that people don’t fall into poverty because of having to pay out-of-pocket for health costs. Over the last 20 years, financial protection has progressively deteriorated, with 2 billion people experiencing financial hardship and 1.3 billion people pushed into poverty due to health spending.  This means that mothers may miss out on the life-saving intervention they need for themselves or their children, people are not diagnosed and treated for noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) on time, with delays in early treatment leading to severe, untreatable or life-threatening illnesses.

Healthier populations build communities that are more resilient, productive, peaceful and prosperous. Health for all is a pre-requisite to achieving the sustainable development goals (SDGs). In spite of numerous high-level political commitments to achieve UHC by 2030, over half of the world’s population still has no access to essential health services.

UHC will remain elusive until governments adequately invest in protecting people – particularly the most vulnerable among us – from impoverishing health spending.

This UHC Day, WHO calls for urgent action to put financial protection measures in place.