The right to health: aspects of the Brazilian neodevelopmentalist model and of the privatization of health

Abstract

This study aims to contend specific current theories that analyze what is known as the Brazilian neodevelopmentalist model. Thus, we plan to discuss the issue of health and its privatization process in Brazil. We consider the relationship between the private and the public sector when regarding financing healthcare and its new management models. For this, we will critically review the literature on these topics and will present syntheses to aid in the understanding of the current Brazilian healthcare situation. In this context, treating health as a right in capitalist societies is a task that involves many different players; however, it also involves what was historically constructed around the private appropriation of health and its dominant sectors. We discuss the transfer of public resources to private sector incentives in health before and after the establishment of the Brazilian National Public Health System. Furthermore, we report on the public administration of the private sector in recent years. We note that the neoliberal heritage from the 1990s created the basis for Brazil’s current economic model, which results in the limited and compensatory reach of healthcare among Brazilian citizens of lower socioeconomic classes. It also reflects the roots of social security, in which health is one of the factors affected by contractions in the system. Thus, the right to health is further limited.