The Challenge of Providing Long-Term Care Benefits in Mexico to IMSS Members

Objective: This study to analyze the possibility of integrating long-term care into Mexican social security as a benefit for formal workers, with the aim of recognizing functional dependency as a new social contingency protected in the Mexican political constitution and the regulations of the Mexican Social Security Institute IMSS. Theoretical Framework: It is based on the postulates of Social Security Law as a human right, despite the fact that in Mexico it is laborized due to its historical origin, which forces social security as a tool to focus on formal workers, while contrasting social rights and the relationship with functional dependency in the face of the conditions of advanced modernity that forces the recognition of new protected contingencies in Mexico to give way to new branches of insurance. Method: The work is developed through a qualitative approach, a deductive method aided by the analytical method and the documentary technique, reviewing the regulations of the Mexican Social Security Institute, social security texts, social rights, long-term care, functional dependency, while analyzing the relationship of the insurance branches within the IMSS with care and functional dependency. Results and Discussion: The results obtained revealed that the current insurance branches are unable to adequately protect the beneficiaries of functional dependency or the needs of long-term care, regardless of whether they arise through aging, work accidents, non-occupational diseases or congenital conditions, therefore; the need to reform the constitution to add functional dependency as a social risk protected by social security is discussed. Research Implications: once the research is completed, it is concluded that in view of the aging population, the increase in life expectancy of people, accidents, the change in the epidemiological profile, congenital conditions and the prevalent disability in the country, added to the gender and economic inequality that has caused the excessive burden of care provided under a private approach, mainly by women, it is necessary to reform social security by adding benefits specifically dedicated to long-term care, a product of the social risk of functional dependency. Originality/Value: The contribution of the research focuses on the right to care and the needs of people in a situation of functional dependency to receive economic and in-kind benefits within Mexican social security, specifically in the IMSS.