Covid boosts private healthcare plans in Brazil

Hospital in Duque de Caxias. Photo: Photocarioca/Shutterstock

After two years of the pandemic, the number of Brazilians who took out private healthcare insurance policies saw its highest growth since 2013 — when families had some of their highest levels of purchasing power in recent times.

The total number of private health plan beneficiaries grew 3.1 percent in February of this year, up from 47.5 million a year before to 49 million, according to data from the Institute for Supplementary Health Studies.

The sector had been in a long slump ever since the start of the recession in 2015. In 2020, however, the total number of healthcare customers increased by 0.9 percent in the first year of the pandemic.

According to the institute, recent growth can be explained by the increase in the number of formal jobs created in 2021, which ended the year with a positive balance of 2.7 million. Collective corporate insurance plans — in which companies grant healthcare policies to their employees — saw a 4.8-percent increase.

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Amanda Audi

Amanda Audi is a journalist specializing in politics and human rights. She is the former executive director of Congresso em Foco and worked as a reporter for The Intercept Brasil, Folha de S. Paulo, O Globo, Gazeta do Povo, Poder360, among others. In 2019, she won the Comunique-se Award for best-written media reporter and won the Mulher Imprensa award for web journalism in 2020