Notes from the Debate on “Expanded Concept of Health” in Brazil: Ethical-Political Implications and Contextual Mobilization

Abstract

Recent history shows that conceptual issues can undertake potent mobilization in concrete actions of everyday life, as was the case of the debate in Brazil on “expanded concept of health” in the 1980s. It is possible to claim that discussion’s ethical-political aspects had implications for the process that led to the constitution, and implementation of the Sistema único de Saúde—SUS1 in 1990. Based on such assumptions, I develop a theoretical essay aiming to bring part of the rich conceptual discussions on health and disease accumulated in Brazilian Public Health. In the first two topics, I analyze two classic books, “A doença”2 by Berlinguer (1988) and “O que é saúde?”3 by Almeida-Filho (2011), trying to show the differentiated contribution that such works develop with respect to interpretations and contextualization that “health” and “disease” can be offer—in addittion to the biomedical paradigm. Featured categories are addressed in these works, which allow further dialogue with relevant issues of everyday life. Lastly, I argue that the incorporation of conceptual problematizations can bring important contributions related to practices health care, especially in terms of physical education integration’s in the spheres of public health services.