Pharmaceutical services in primary healthcare and the Farmácia Popular Program: the perspective of public administrators from subnational spheres of the Brazilian National Health System

Abstract

This study aimed to identify the perception of public administrators from pharmaceutical services in subnational spheres, and of technical administrators from collegiate instances of the Brazilian National Health System on the impacts of the Farmácia Popular do Brasil Program (PFPB – Brazilian Popular Pharmacy Program), an exclusively federal initiative, in the administration of pharmaceutical services in primary health care (AFAB), of the responsibility of the three government levels and operationalized by the municipalities. Municipal, state and technical administrators from the National Council of Municipal Health Secretaries and from the National Council of Health Secretaries were interviewed. Content analysis considered the categories: (1) challenges and advances of AFAB and PFPB and (2) connections between AFAB and PFPB. There were different visions on the relations between them, either competing or complementing. The contrast between the growing investments in the PFPB and their stagnation in the AFAB, the overlapping of lists of medications, patient migration and the role of the PFPB as an access alternative, among others, were highlighted. The centralized implementation of the PFPB seems to have happened with poor articulation with subnational spheres of management, generating distinct and conflicting interpretations about the program’s role and objectives for the municipalities, considering the decentralization guidelines of pharmaceutical services.