The global initiative Partnership for Health System Sustainability and Resilience (PHSSR) launched a report that identified the strengths and weaknesses of Brazil’s healthcare system and made more than 40 recommendations for public policies that could be implemented. Unprecedented in the country, the document was published in the magazine “Iniciativas em ESG – Associadas ABIMED”, which can be accessed here.

Brazil is the first Latin American country to join the PHSSR, which was created in 2020 from a partnership between the London School of Economics, the World Economic Forum and AstraZeneca. It currently includes partners such as the World Health Organization, Philips, and KPMG, and is present in more than 30 countries.

The recommendations aim to make the Brazilian healthcare system more resilient and sustainable, covering seven subjects:

• Governance: improving the regulation of SUS principles (universality, integrality, decentralization and social participation) to ensure sustainable and equitable progress, as well as integrating available healthcare information and databases from different sources, both public and private;

• Financing: establish a progressive increase in the financial resources invested in the Unified Health System, from 4% to 6% of GDP over 10 years, with the aim of making the system more sustainable and redefining criteria for allocating funding and other resources to the SUS according to population and epidemiological needs;

• Medicines and Technology: strengthening health technology and production development policies to ensure universal access and greater competitiveness of local production, as well as prioritizing the digital transformation of the healthcare system;

• Workforce: articulate health and education policies to align technical, undergraduate, residency and postgraduate training according to the needs of the system and develop digital healthcare skills;

• Provision of health services: prioritize primary care as the main source of access for comprehensive care and establish emergency actions to address unmet health needs that have been exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic;

• Population health and social determinants: improving the regulation of commercial activities and practices that affect health, including tobacco, unhealthy food and/or alcohol, and strengthening the capacity for intersectoral action to draw up policies for the segment;

• Environmental sustainability: encouraging the participation of the health sector in environmental issues, including strategies to strengthen SUS in the Amazon region and the role of local communities, as well as the transition to green energy sources in the SUS.