Public health insurance and ethnic disparities in maternal health care: the case of vulnerable Mexican women over the last 25 years

Abstract

Abstract This article examines the coverage in the continuum of antenatal–postnatal care for vulnerable women in Mexico according to indigenous status and assesses the influence of public health insurance strategies on the evolution of coverage over the last 25 years. We studied a total of 19 613 567 Mexican women, aged 12–54 years at last birth, based on a pooled cross-sectional analysis of data from the 1997, 2009, 2014 and 2018 waves of the National Survey of Demographic Dynamics. After describing sociodemographic characteristics and maternal-health coverage by indigenous status, we constructed a pooled fixed-effects and interaction multivariable regression model to assess the influence of the Seguro Popular programme on continuum of care. We estimated adjusted continuum of care coverage between 1994 and 2018 according to Seguro Popular affiliation and indigenous status. Prior to the Seguro Popular programme, crude coverage in the continuum of care for non-indigenous women stood at 14.5% [95% confidence interval (CI): 13.2–15.8%] or 11 percentage points higher than for indigenous women. During the last period of the programme, it rose to 46.5% [95% CI: 45.6–47.5%] and 34.1% [95% CI: 30.7–37.4%], respectively. Our regression analysis corroborated findings that, on average, indigenous women faced lower odds of benefiting from continuum of care [adjusted odds ratio (aOR) = 0.48, 95% CI: 0.40–0.57] than did their non-indigenous counterparts. It also revealed that coverage for indigenous women without Seguro Popular affiliation was 26.7% [95% CI: 23.3–30.1%] or 12 percentage points lower than for those with Seguro Popular affiliation (38.6%, 95% CI: 35.7–41.4%). Our regression results confirmed that the latter benefited from higher odds of continuum of care (aOR = 1.67, 95% CI: 1.36–2.26). Gaps between those of indigenous and non-indigenous status have persisted, but the Seguro Popular clearly contributed to reducing the coverage gaps between these two groups of women. Strategies yielding better outcomes are required to improve the structural conditions of indigenous populations.