Draft:Health reform in Brazil

Introduction
The Health Reform was a social movement leaded by professionals and militants of health that proposed to think Brazilian Healthcare System aiming to create a universal, democratic system.

A very influential intellectual of this movement was the healthcare specialist Sérgio Arouca, very much involved with themes related to health management and the defense of strong public services. He was a member of the Brazilian Communist Party, in which he fought for the restablishment of democracy in Brazil, for a free, universal healthcare system and for other important economic reforms.

Historical and political context
Even though it has started in the 1970's, during the military dictatorship in Brazil, with the creation of the Centro Brasileiro de Estudos de Saúde (Cebes), it was during the 8th National Health Conference (1986), after democracy was restablished in Brazil, that the reform has reached its climax.

Abroad, it was adopted by the World Health Organization the Alma Ata Declaration, which recognized health as a right of all the peoples and a duty of the nations, with and emphasis on Primary health care. This declaration, in a certain way, built the basis for what would become the Brazilian Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS).

Theoretical foundation
I was based mostly on the Marxist theory, specially on the method of Materialism, seeing the social and biological not as antagonistic entities, but as factors which are related; and disease not as a natural process, but a historically and socially constructed phenomenon.

It was also influenced by Eurocommunism and the thinking of Antonio Gramsci.

Outcomes
The health reform paved the way to the creation of the SUS, the decentralized, democratic brazilian healthcare system, approved by the Brazilian Constituent Assembly (1988).

Criticism
Some marxist authors point that the reform, initially Socialist leaned, turned Social democrat. That has happened, according to them, because when the SUS was created, the movement found itself satisfied and began to operate within its limits, i.e. the State limits.