Health Insurance: Iraq

The Republic of Iraq with a population of 45 million is planning to introduce a national health insurance system to cover all the Iraq population. The Health system in Iraq is highly centralised with large proportion of it is delivered through the private sector (60 public and 40 private). The private sector is not regulated and the public sector is not well financed and suffered immensely since 1980 due to wars and civilian unrest. 

To introduce a national health insurance, as the recent Act (2021) envisaged, the health system should address many issues and prepare the ground for such major step. Most of the ingredients are missing Finance, Regulations, Service Delivery, Workforce, Governance.  

The talk presented in Baghdad to health leaders and senior managers provided a comprehensive plan to prepare the health system in Iraq for this major undertaking.  The WHOCC Team will support the team at the Health Insurance Authority and Ministry of Health in this complex project.

Slides for the talk can be found through the link:

Health system ingredients for effective primary care serving a national health insurance Iraq National Health Insurance Organisation 29th April 2022