21st-century capitalism: structural challenges for universal health care.

The structural perspective outlined here sheds light on some of the fundamental challenges involved in achieving Universal Health Care (UHC) in this twenty-first-century era of trade and financialized capitalism. This commentary explores connections between the structure of twenty-first-century capitalism and challenges to achieving UHC, discussing three features of today's capitalism: financialized capitalism; trade, intangibles and global value chains; and inequality (as exacerbated by the first two features). The final section discusses the various opportunities for reform to facilitate UHC-from tinkering with the status quo, to deeper regulatory reform and fundamental structural change.

Brazilian public health in the context of a statecrisis or a crisis of capitalism? / A saúde pública brasileira no contexto da crise do estado ou do capitalismo?

This article aims to analyze the trend of Brazilian universal public health in the context of the structural crisis of capitalism, articulating the interests of capital and of the State, without being possible to refer to a crisis of the Modern State. To do so, the article is organized into two parts. The first part seeks to analyze the nature of the crisis, identifying trends in the development of capitalism, especially in the last decades of the 20th century and in the first decade of the 21st century, with emphasis on the Marxian law of the tendency of the rate of profit to fall and the dominance of the interest-bearing capital. The second part discusses the impacts of this crisis on the universal right to health in Brazil, especially since the 1990s, confirming the uncertainties of the funding of the Brazilian National Health System (SUS) and the growing movement of capital appropriation on the resources of social policies of social security rights, especially related to health. Lastly, final considerations are presented, including proposals to address this situation of instability and underfunding of the health system.

Este artigo tem como objetivo analisar a tendência da saúde publica universal brasileira no contexto da crise estrutural do capitalismo, articulando os interesses do capital e do Estado, sem que seja possível se referir à uma crise do Estado Moderno. Para tanto, o artigo está organizado em duas partes. A primeira parte busca analisar a natureza da crise, identificando tendências do desenvolvimento do capitalismo, principalmente nas últimas décadas do século XX e na primeira década do século XXI, com destaque para a lei marxiana da queda tendencial da taxa de lucro e a dominância do capital portador de juros. A segunda parte discute os impactos dessa crise ao direito universal da saúde no Brasil, especialmente, a partir dos anos 1990, confirmando as incertezas do financiamento do SUS e o crescente movimento de apropriação do capital sobre os recursos das políticas sociais de direitos, as da seguridade social, especialmente a saúde. Por fim, são apresentadas as considerações finais, incluindo algumas propostas para enfrentar esse quadro de instabilidade e subfinanciamento desse sistema de saúde.