Trade unionism, Unified Health System (SUS) and private health insurance

Abstract

The article intends to discuss the patterns of interlocution between the Brazilian trade unionism, the public health system (SUS) and the private health insurance sector. Some thesis originated in the Public Health area about the subject are debated, in the light of more recent Social Science's studies concerned the Brazilian unionism. It presents a documentary analysis for the case of the largest National Workers Organization, named CUT. The need to discuss the problem in distinct political and economic conjunctures of the country is pointed out. The conflicts between the workers and the companies, added to the unemployment and deregulation of the labor markets, display the limits of private insurance markets in offering comprehensive health coverage and impel the workers representation to plead the state intervention in this market. The complexity of this dynamics gave impulse to the emergency of a syndicalism who is interested in the management of the complementary pension funds and private health plans. At the same time, the present conjuncture brings new possibilities to take the trade unionism back in the political arena, with the aim to agglutinate the interests of ample segments of the workers to pressure the State in the defense of the public health system improvement.