Supply of Medicines by the State: main jurisprudences of the Superior Courts in Brazil

ABSTRACT: Health, a fundamental social right provided for in the Federal Constitution of 1988, is part of a larger context of social protection of the State oriented towards the organization of governmental public functions for the promotion, protection and recovery of the health of individuals and the community. Judicialization, represented by the pursuit of the Judiciary to implement a fundamental right, happens when there is inertia and/or ineffectiveness of access to public policies aimed at the health of the individual, among them, the policy of access to medicines. The general objective of the research was to analyze the judicialization regarding the supply of medicines by the State and to identify the main judicial demands judged by the Superior Courts in Brazil (STF and STJ) between the years 2018 and 2022 regarding this theme. The methodology used was the bibliographic and documentary research of the judgments handed down by the STF and STJ in that time frame. Therefore, in view of the results, it is concluded that the superior courts have a fundamental role in the standardization of jurisprudential understandings regarding demands as sensitive as the realization of the fundamental right to health, more specifically, access to medicines by citizens.