Social Health Insurance
Social health insurance (SHI) is a method for financing health care costs through a social insurance program based on the collection of funds contributed by individuals, employers, and sometimes government subsidies. It is one of the five main ways that health care systems are funded. Â SHI systems are characterized by the presence of sickness funds which usually receive a proportional contribution of their members’ wages. With this insurance contributions these funds pay medical costs of their members, to the extent that the services are included in the, sometimes nationally defined, benefit package. Affiliation to such funds is usually based on professional, geographic, religious/political and/or non-partisan criteria.