Health systems in transition : Uzbekistan

3.5 Voluntary health insurance
VHI accounts for only a very small share of total health expenditure in 
Uzbekistan (Table 3.2). At present, only very few companies in the country 
offer this kind of insurance. 
3.6 Other sources of finance 
The exact volume of voluntary and charitable funding has not been documented. 
International charitable funds are channelled to public sector providers through 
the Ministry of Health. 
Parallel health systems comprise a sizable share of public sector health 
financing and different government agencies, such as the Ministry of Internal 
Affairs, the national security services, and the Ministry of Defence, run their 
own health systems. As these health systems fall outside the framework of the 
Ministry of Health, precise financial data are not readily available. There is no 
legislation that prevents those eligible for parallel health systems from accessing 

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Health systems in transition
  
Uzbekistan
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the system run by the Ministry of Health, and it is not clear if the respective 
agencies have internal policies for preventing their employees from utilizing 
the Ministry of Health system. However, as there are no official charges in 
the parallel health systems and there is comparatively better coverage with 
pharmaceuticals, few people who have access to parallel health systems seem 
to switch to the general public sector.