In 2025, the number of active graduate programs in Public Health in Brazil reached a significant milestone of 101, spread across the country. To discuss this achievement, its significance, and the challenges that still lie ahead, the “Interview with Authors” program of the journal Cadernos de Saúde Pública (CSP) brought together some of the co-authors of the Perspective article “Graduate Programs in Public Health in Brazil: Trajectories, Evaluation, and Challenges,” recently published in the journal. Participating in the conversation, moderated by co-editor-in-chief Marilia Sá Carvalho, were Rômulo Paes Sousa, Aylene Bousquat, and Bernardo Horta.
For Rômulo Paes Sousa, a researcher at Fiocruz Minas Gerais and president of Abrasco, the emergence of Public Health in Brazil in the 1970s was not an isolated academic phenomenon; it was: “a kind of total social fact.” The field emerged in the midst of the military dictatorship with an agenda that integrated political, social, and scientific dimensions, committed to building a health system and reducing inequalities.
In this sense, graduate education did not emerge merely as a strategy for training human resources, but as part of a national project. “Public Health is part of this great momentum that Brazil has toward democracy, inclusion, and the fight against inequalities,” stated Rômulo.
101 programs: is that a lot or a little?
The question was posed as a thought-provoking challenge by CSP co-editor Marilia, to gain a better understanding of this significant number of programs. For Aylene Bousquat, a professor at USP and current deputy coordinator of the Public Health division at CAPES, the answer requires context. She noted that Brazil’s graduate education policy began with 167 programs in just 23 municipalities in 1970 and now encompasses more than 4,500 programs across over 360 municipalities, the result of decades of public investment.
Even so, Brazil remains below the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) average in the number of master’s and doctoral degree holders. “There is no country in the world that has developed or fought poverty without investing in science and technology and without a massive training of master’s and doctoral degree holders,” stated Aylene. In Public Health, there is an important distinction: “Our master’s and doctoral degree holders are working to build our health and education systems,” a profile distinct from that observed in other fields of knowledge.
Bernardo Horta, a professor at UFPel and the current coordinator of the Public Health division at CAPES, provided a concrete example of the field’s transformative impact. Shortly before the recording, he had been in Tabatinga, Amazonas, to support the first students in a master’s program in Public Health designed for Indigenous professionals. “All the students who are graduating are already employed in different segments of the Unified Health System,” he reported.
According to Rômulo Paes Sousa, the expansion of graduate programs parallels the successive waves of growth in the SUS and the urgent need to redistribute expertise beyond the state capitals and the coast. “Public Health is doing its part, or at least trying very hard,” he stated.
Productivity in Question: Toward an Evaluation That Values What Matters
One of the central themes of the debate was the ongoing shift in program evaluation from a model based on the number of articles to one that emphasizes more qualitative criteria. Bernardo Horta got straight to the point: “In the early 2000s, our field jumped from an average of 2 articles per tenured faculty member per year to 5.1 articles per tenured faculty member per year.”
For him, this quantitative growth does not automatically translate into quality, and publication in predatory journals is one of the symptoms of the problem. Citing a famous CSP editorial on “More of the Same,” Horta indicated that a change in mindset is needed: “When I sit down to write an article, I’m not ‘going to write just another article’; I’m going to try to bring something new, something that contributes, and I’ll want to share that with society afterward.”
Perspectivas can be read in full on the CSP website. And the program is available in audio format on CSPCast and on ENSP’s YouTube channel.