The Brazilian SUS is one of the largest universal health systems in the world. This policy brief outlines a series of recommendations to enhance shared management within SUS's existing institutional framework, in accordance with the constitutional principle of regionalisation of health. Key proposals include increasing resources and professionalising the regional branches of state health secretariats to provide stronger support to municipalities.

This report, commissioned by the Global Innovation Hub for Improving Value in Health and produced by the Lemann Foundation Programme, looks at coordination and equity in health as two key focus areas.

This report is based on a series of interviews conducted with state health secretaries and other stakeholders in Brazil’s public health system and aims to inform and support state administrations in the country.

This policy brief, written in March 2020, argues finance (rather than development of new vaccine technology) was likely to be the binding constraint on the timing of broad and equitable global availability of COVID-19 vaccines.

In a critical examination of the health security paradigm, this report argues that, while the security implications of pandemics are clear, the concept of health security distracts attention from the underlying determinants of health that exacerbate the effects of severe disease outbreaks and disproportionately affect the most vulnerable. The report offers recommendations for developing and sustaining a human-centred approach to global health.

Julia Sawatzky

Kristine Husøy Onarheim

John-Arne Røttingen