Strategies for Creating Tax-Based Sustainable Financial Resources in Iran's Health System: a Qualitative Study

Background: Ensuring uninterrupted and free access to health services highlights the critical need for sustainable health financing. Given that tax revenues are essential for achieving universal health coverage, this study, conducted in 2024, aims to identify strategies for generating sustainable financial resources through taxation.

Methods: This qualitative study gathered data through in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 10 experts. Participant selection continued until data saturation was achieved, using purposeful and snowball sampling to ensure maximum diversity. Thematic analysis was employed for data analysis, using Atlas.ti software (version 8).

Findings: The study identified strategies for generating tax-based sustainable financial resources across five main topics: transportation, services, production, individuals, and 11 subtopics. These subtopics include traffic control schemes, highway and road tolls, taxes on urban and intercity transportation systems, fines for traffic violations and vehicle inspection deficiencies, equipment and device imports, corporate sales and revenue, health-damaging products, environmental pollutants, industrial production and petroleum products, businesses and occupations, and long-term exit or migration taxes for health professionals.

Conclusions: Implementing tax policies on the identified items requires strong political support, fostering a shared understanding among stakeholders at various levels of policy-making and implementation, and aligning executive program designs with existing infrastructure. Enhancing regulatory systems and increasing transparency in resource allocation are also essential to improving the implementation of health-related tax policies. Further research should carefully examine the economic and social side effects of these taxes on different sectors of society.