Majority says corruption is responsible for poor quality of public health system

Problems in the Brazilian public health system (doctors on strike,
equipment and material shortfalls and, once in a while, someone dying in
line waiting to see a doctor) could be resolved if corruption was
eliminated. At least that is what 82% of the people interviewed in a
public opinion poll said.

The poll, run by one of the country’s most prestigious pollsters,
Ibope, for the National Confederation of Industry (“CNI”), interviewed
2,002 people in 141 municipalities around the country.

Only 4% of those interviewed said they believed that the government
should increase taxes in order to get more funds for the public health
system.

The poll found that 96% of those interviewed had used either the public
or private health systems at some time and 61% said they had done so
within the last 12 months. Out of those, the majority, 79%, got
outpatient treatment at a public hospital.

When asked to grade, on a scale of 1 to 10, public and private
hospitals, interviewees gave the public system a grade of 5.7, and the
private system 8.1.

Asked how the public system could be improved, 57% said there should be
more doctors, and 63% said they favored privatization of the public
system, transferring the management of public hospitals to the private
sector, believing it would result in better quality of treatment.

As Brazilians are notorious for self-medication and negotiating
medications with pharmacists (instead of making an appointment with a
doctor), it was a surprise to the pollsters that 84% of those
interviewed said they were in favor of a recent government measure to
control the use of antibiotics that requires a copy of a prescription
for antibiotics to be left at a pharmacy so that there is some control.

Interestingly, 71% of those interviewed said they considered preventive
medicine more important than the construction of hospitals.

A large majority of those interviewed said generic medicines were as
good as famous brand name medicines and 80% said natural childbirth was
better than a cesarean section (although Brazil has one of the highest
rates of cesarean sections in the world).

The poll found that people with higher incomes or higher levels of
education had more strongly negative opinions about the public health
system. Negative opinions were also more prevalent in larger urban areas
(cities with over 100,000 inhabitants) than in rural areas or smaller
cities. Finally, women were slightly more negative about the public
health system (55%), than men (51%).