Based on non-systematic search of bibliography and of national and international databases and research reports on Brazilian healthcare, this paper reviews health policies and the healthcare service market in Brazil along the 20th century, in an attempt to track the origins and structuring of the Brazilian public health system (Sistema Único de Saúde). Using a historical neoinstitutionalism framework, we discuss institutional arenas and specific relationships between payers, providers and creditors relevant to the various shapes assumed by health policies and the health system in Brazil. Institutional arrangements derived from interactions between successive political actors seem to have had a role both on present patterns of healthcare service supply and on restrictions and challenges faced by SUS.
Health policies; Healthcare sector; SUS; Institutional arrangements; Healthcare services