Advancing health equity and promoting a healthier Taiwan on the 30th anniversary of Taiwan’s National Health Insurance system
Dr. Chiu Tai-yuan
Minister of Health and Welfare
ROC (Taiwan)
Health is a fundamental human right and a universal value. Improved health results in greater well-being for the people and has ramifications for the survival and development of a country and even the world. At the 77th World Health Assembly, members adopted the World Health Organization (WHO) Fourteenth General Programme of Work for 2025-2028. The program includes such strategic objectives as improving health service coverage and bolstering financial protections to ensure universal health coverage. WHO has called on all countries to take action on these issues.
As concerns universal health coverage, Taiwan launched the National Health Insurance (NHI) system in 1995. The scheme, which brought together already existing occupational insurance schemes, has reached its 30th year and now covers 99.9 percent of the population. The NHI system provides equitable, accessible, and efficient healthcare to all people in Taiwan. It is also an important pillar and guarantor of Taiwan’s social stability as well as people’s health and safety. It has, moreover, become a global benchmark for achieving universal health coverage. In an annual survey carried out by Numbeo, Taiwan has been ranked first in the Health Care Index category for seven consecutive years.
The NHI operates on a pay-as-you-go, self-sustaining model capable of addressing the financial challenges posed by an aging population and rising healthcare costs. By reforming premium rates and adding additional funding sources, such as the tobacco health and welfare surcharge, the system is on a sound, sustainable footing.
To promote the health of our people, President Lai Ching-te articulated a vision of a healthy Taiwan in 2024. This aims to ensure that people are healthy, the nation is strong, and the world is more ready to embrace Taiwan. Remaining focused on people, families, and communities, we are expanding health promotion operations and preventive healthcare.
In this rapidly changing era, health challenges transcend borders, and global cooperation has become essential to addressing various health crises. However, Taiwan has been prevented from participating in WHO—the foremost global health cooperation body—due to China’s continued distortion of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2758 and World Health Assembly Resolution 25.1. Neither of these resolutions mentions Taiwan or declares that Taiwan is part of the People’s Republic of China. Therefore, these resolutions have no power to confer upon the PRC any right to represent Taiwan in WHO.
In light of this, and to uphold the core UN values of inclusiveness and universality, we urge WHO and all relevant parties to recognize Taiwan’s considerable contributions to global public health and the human right to health. It is imperative that WHO adopt a more open-minded approach and demonstrate flexibility, adhering to the principles of professionalism and inclusivity. Taiwan should be included, as a matter of pragmatism, in the World Health Assembly and all WHO meetings, activities, and mechanisms, particularly those concerned with the WHO pandemic agreement.
