Utopia without daydreaming: Our struggle for health is about a different political project – Interview with Maria Inês Barbosa

Abstract

Maria Inês da Silva Barbosa, a social worker, professor, and PhD in Public Health (USP, 1998), played a significant role in the formulation of the National Policy for the Comprehensive Health of the Black Population (PNSIPN, 2009). This policy is characterized by the recognition of institutional racism and ethnic-racial inequalities as social determinants of health conditions, which highlighted the specific health demands of the Black population and expanded the debate, training, and articulation on the subject to strengthen the anti-racist agenda within the Unified Health System (acronym in Portuguese – SUS). The PNSIPN is the result of decades of struggle by the Brazilian Black social movements for the democratization of access to public health. It was within this context of struggles that Professor Maria Inês da Silva Barbosa joined the first administration of the Secretariat for Policies to Promote Racial Equality (Seppir) in 2003, working with civil society and the Ministry of Health to formulate the policy.