IMSS, Brazil, PAHO Strengthen Hospital Resilience Cooperation

IMSS, Brazil's Ministry of Health, and PAHO launched a technical exchange to strengthen hospital resilience against emergencies, disasters, and climate threats, reflecting Mexico's deepening role in PAHO's regional resilient-hospitals framework. The partnership links ongoing federal hospital construction, including projects under the MX$181 billion infrastructure plan, to international resilience and sustainability standards. 

The Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS) opened a three-day technical exchange on July 27, 2026, with Brazil's Ministry of Health and the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO) to strengthen hospital resilience across Latin America. Running through July 29, the program combines conferences, technical sessions, and field visits to two IMSS hospitals in Morelos and the State of Mexico. The exchange centers on how safety, sustainability, inclusion, and continuity-of-care criteria can move from planning documents into daily hospital operations.

Álvaro Velarca, Head of the Office of the Director General, IMSS, opened the exchange during a session of the IMSS Technical Council, describing a program that pairs analysis with direct observation of hospital infrastructure at different stages of development. "The mission combines spaces for analysis with direct observation of hospital infrastructure at different stages of development," says Velarca. Alva Santos, Director of Medical Benefits, IMSS, adds that resilience criteria need to be built in from the planning stage through routine operation, not treated as an afterthought once a facility opens, since safe hospital infrastructure alone cannot sustain care if operational processes fail during a crisis.

Hospital resilience, as institutions describe it, refers to a facility's capacity to adapt to, respond to, recover from, and sustain services through adverse events, encompassing service organization, resource efficiency, accessibility, and institutional learning, in addition to structural safety.  

The approach builds on regional data showing the scale of exposure: 88% of hospitals in the Americas face at least one natural threat, according to PAHO. The organization's Smart Hospitals program, which grew out of an earlier Safe Hospitals initiative, has already improved resilience in more than 70 facilities across seven Caribbean countries, cutting operational costs by 30% to 60% through energy and water efficiency gains.

Mexico's involvement extends beyond hosting delegates. IMSS is home to the WHO Collaborating Center for Resilient Health Services (MEX-35), which already supports implementation of PAHO's regional resilient-hospitals initiative across 250 facilities in seven Latin American countries, making the Mexico-Brazil exchange an extension of a technical role IMSS already plays regionally. The cooperation also follows Mexico's broader push to formalize its relationship with PAHO and the World Health Organization: the Ministry of Health signed a Country Cooperation Strategy for 2026 to 2030 with the organization weeks earlier, and José Moya, Representative in Mexico, PAHO, participated in both efforts, calling international cooperation essential to hospitals capable of sustaining safe, continuous care during emergencies and disasters.

The first field visit, on July 28, takes the Brazilian delegation and PAHO specialists to the General Zone Hospital under construction in Yecapixtla, Morelos, part of a broader federal buildout that IMSS has folded into a MX$181 billion hospital infrastructure plan running through 2030. Observing a facility mid-construction lets the delegations examine how feasibility, safety, accessibility, and sustainability criteria are incorporated before a hospital opens, when design decisions still shape long-term performance. 

 The second visit, on July 29, moves to General Zone Hospital No. 252 in Atlacomulco, State of Mexico, an operating facility where the same principles get tested against service organization, resource use, and continuity of care under standard working conditions. Comparing a hospital in construction against one already running the gives both delegations two complementary reference points for adapting practices to other contexts in the region.

Mirela Pilon, of Brazil's Ministry of Health, links the resilience push to preparing for the effects of climate change, framing sustainability less as an environmental checkbox and more as a component of institutional preparedness against events capable of interrupting care. She describes the exchange as an opportunity for mutual learning between two health systems with distinct capacities and constraints, rather than a one-way transfer of a single model.

No new investment commitments, infrastructure projects, or regulatory changes were announced during the opening session. Velarca indicated the cooperation runs in both directions, with Mexico sharing its progress and remaining gaps while learning from innovations developed within Brazil's health system. The extent of the exchange's impact will depend on whether institutions convert the shared lessons into criteria applied consistently across planning, evaluation, and operation, rather than isolated improvements at the two hospitals under review this week.