ETHICAL-POLITICAL SUFFERING AND THE BRAZILIAN SANITARY REFORM: CONSIDERATIONS ABOUT THE WORKERS OF A FAMILY HEALTH UNITY

Abstract

This article has had the objective of raising some consideration about ethical-political suffering of workers of a family health program in their work process. The research was developed in a Family Health Unit (FHU) in João Pessoa, PB (Brazil). Under the perspective of a qualitative methodology, interviews and focal groups were conducted with workers, in addition to participating observation at their working place in the FHU. In order to achieve the research aims, data collected were analyzed according to Minayo’s operative proposal on dialectic hermeneutics. In that proposal, data must be interpreted in view of comprehending their expressive meaning and historical determination, therefore adding the communicative capacity of hermeneutics to the critical capacity of dialectic. Results have shown workers’ impotency towards user’s care as the emblematic struggle of the research, occasioned by the precarious work conditions. In order to get over the precarious situation, workers find palliative alternatives to make the care of users become a possibility. This study has pointed out that the critical potential of the ethical-political suffering is found dug under an immediate and assistance moral duty. At last, the critical aspect of the ethical-political suffering is brought back as an important factor for social mobilization in defense of the Brazilian sanitary reform. DESCRIPTORS: Health Policy. Family Health Program. Occupational Health.