Female surgical sterilization in Brazil, 2000 to 2006: Compliance with the family planning law and frustrated demand

Abstract

Brazilian Act 9263, of 1996, ended a historic omission by the Brazilian State regarding family planning policies. Among other provisions, the law legalized surgical sterilization in the public health system. In contrast, Ministry of Health ordinances No. 144, of 1997, and No. 48, of 1999, set down potentially restrictive criteria for obtaining tubal ligation in compliance with law. If non-compliance with the regulation is related to the mandatory 60-day counselling period and to the prohibition of tubal ligation until the 42nd day postpartum, some refusals by professionals involved in providing ligation result from these individuals’ personal perceptions and attitudes regarding criteria such as age and number of children, and regarding the possible implications of the sterilization for the petitioner. Explicit and implicit refusals result in frustrated demand. The same logic applies to the municipal level of health management and is reflected in the non-existence of accredited services in most municipalities with hospital capacity to offer the procedure. Employing data from the 2006 PNDS and hospitalization authorization records, this paper first examines compliance with the regulation on tubal sterilizations performed in the Federal Public Health System (SUS) between 2000-2006 as well as the number of municipalities, even with accredited hospitals in 2006 and 2013. The frustrated demand is examined on the basis of information from the PNDS (DHS) 2006 regarding failed attempts due to refusals of the service sought, failure to provide motives, and non-consent by spouses.