Universal health coverage has achieved high priority on the global political agenda latest since the publication of the World Health Report 2015 called Health financing - the path to universal health coverage. But for all fundamental agreement about the importance of social protection, considerable differences exist with regards to the concepts of universal coverage and the strategies for achieving it. The special issue published by the kompart publishing in co-operation with the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (giz) entitled What makes the world healthy? Provides an overview of the endeavour of various countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America for protecting their population from the financial risks of ill health.