Colombia's Health Minister Guillermo Alfonso Jaramillo appeared before the Constitutional Court on Monday to defend the UPC increase set at the end of 2025, during a technical hearing called over a contempt charge.
The hearing, starting at 8:00 a.m., aims to verify the UPC calculation, the per capita value Adres pays EPS for each affiliate's health care. Four months earlier, the Court opened a contempt case against Jaramillo for alleged non-compliance and requested probes by the Fiscalía and Procuraduría.
The minister rejected pressures for larger hikes: "We cannot allow a series of actors to conspire to demand a UPC increase." He defended the 9.03% adjustment, citing technical criteria despite criticism from groups like Andi, Acemi, and Afidro, and a prosecutorial document finding no irregularities in UPC use.
Jaramillo blamed EPS failures: "They put me here to answer for what the EPS do not do (...) What needs to be done is to liquidate them." He expressed openness to a new methodology. Acemi's Ana María Vesga called for at least 17.33%, citing inflation and minimum wage rises.
Adres director Félix León Martínez attributed the health system's crisis to poor EPS data quality, not funding shortfalls, noting historic budget increases from 2022 to 2026.
