The Judicialization of access to medication in Belo Horizonte: An equity issue

Abstract

The objective of this study is to analyze the court lawsuits regarding medications policies in Belo Horizonte, its financial impacts and to contribute briefly to the discussions that involve the theme. For this purpose, 187 to the lawsuits that were judged from the Technical Chamber of Health of the Special Court of Justice of Minas Gerais, from July 1, 2016 to March 3, whose objective was to supply medication by the county. Under the constitutional argument that "health is a right for all and a duty of the State," the Brazilian State has also faced the so-called Health Judicialization and, by means of the judiciary, has been forced to grant healthcare goods and services without observing the Clinical Protocol and Therapeutic Guidelines (Protocolos Clínicos e Diretrizes Terapêuticas [PCDT]). It was observed that 93.6% of the sample had an application for injunction, of which 80.7% were accepted, albeit partially, and only 3.7% were rejected. In this sense, it threatens the principle of equality, since interference by the judicial power has contributed to inequality in healthcare, by guaranteeing indiscriminate access to medications to some, to the detriment of those who cannot access them. Thereby reinforcing the conflict between infinite demand and scarce resources in a society that opted for a health system characteristic of a social well-being welfare state and replaced the excluding and unequal system, prior to the Constitution of the Federative Republic of Brazil of 1988, by the free system that is governed by principles, of universality, integrality and equity.