The Front for Life and updating the Brazilian Health Sector Reform Movement

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze Frente pela Vida (FPV), a civil society movement organized in the health field, which has sought to make a political impact in the face of the health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in the context of the Bolsonaro government. Information was obtained through a document review of FPV publications, as well as participant observation in meetings, demonstrations, livestreams and events in which it participated or organized, in addition to interviews with participants from its operative group. Analysis considered the categories of origin, trajectory, movements, management, the relationship between FPV and the health movement, sustainability, challenges and FPV’s perspectives. Results show that FPV has led a large network of policies made up of individual and collective subjects, scientific entities and organizations representing various segments of civil society, shaping an update of the health movement with  expansion of its social support base. Its trajectory has mainly included technical-scientific and political action in multiple areas, with the Executive, Judiciary and Legislative branches, as well as civil society. In conclusion, FPV has proved to be an important social movement, pressing the state to defend life, the universal right to health and the expansion and strengthening of the SUS.