Human Rights, mental health and therapeutic communities in Brazil

Abstract

Therapeutic communities are controversial institutions that have increasingly been assuming a central role in Brazilian attention to drug care. This essay tries to picture the moment of reinforcing madhouses as legit institutions and the worsening of disputes in public health policies. Therefore it briefly discusses utopia and reality to think over public health care systems. Furthermore it approaches abstinence as treatment, religious character, public funding and discipline, their central pivots. The adopted method consists on bibliographic review and analysis of eleven reports from different institutions from 2001 to 2023. The conclusion points out therapeutic communities disregard and contempt for human rights bias as so to constitutional and legal framework, pointing out need the necessity of leaving behind those institutions to embark upon a more promising path.