The National Agency of Supplementary Health (NAS) of Brazil introduced the Adequate Childbirth Program (ADP) in 2015. The ADP is a public policy designed to promote wider adoption of obstetric practices oriented to assisting natural births (vaginal delivery as opposed to caesarean delivery) in hospitals of the so-called supplementary health network (SHN). This paper studies the relationship between the ADP and the effectiveness of the right to health of expectant women assisted in SHN hospitals. The study follows ideas and procedures set forth in the literature on the Legal Analysis of Economic Policy (LAEP), which has been proposed as an alternative to the traditional formalist legal approaches, most commonly adopted by jurists in Brazil. Positional Analysis, developed by the LAEP approach, was used to objectively evaluate and compare the obstetric care offered in private hospitals before and after the introduction of the ADP, and in relation to the ideal parameters formulated from expert recommendations, including national and international medical guidelines established by specialized bodies. Empirical data were collected from official records available on the NAS website and from national and international comparative studies. After analyzing the data, the study indicates some limitations of the ADP as a set of measures intended to protect the right to health of expectant women and proposes possible reforms to make this public policy more reliable from a legal point of view.
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