Privately financed health care: Private expenditure accounted for 35.1 percent of total health expenditure in 2011.
VHI is regulated by the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA); health insurers offering voluntary
coverage can vary benefit baskets and premiums and refuse enrollment to applicants based on medical history.
Service prices are usually negotiated directly between insurers and service providers. Unlike statutory
health insurers, voluntary insurers are normally for-profit; often an insurer will have a nonprofit branch offering
SHI and a for-profit branch offering VHI. It is illegal for voluntary insurers to base voluntary insurance
enrollment decisions on health information obtained via basic health coverage, but this rule is not easily
enforced. VHI accounted for 8.6 percent of total health expenditure in 2011. There is no available information
on the number of persons covered; in general, VHI applies to the individual, not to groups