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A partnership between USP’s Faculty of Medical Sciences (FM) and the Federal Public Defender’s Office (DPU), the project Care provided by FMUSP physicians to homeless people assisted by DPU won 1st place in the Government category of the 2024 Justice and Health Award. The award is an initiative of the National Council of Justice (CNJ), through the National Forum of the Judiciary for Health (Fonajus), which seeks to recognize and disseminate actions, projects, or programs aimed at improving judicial policies related to public and supplementary health in Brazil. The award was announced in November during the III National Congress of Fonajusin São Paulo.
The winning project is part of the PopRua program, a set of actions and public policies promoted by the Municipality of São Paulo to assist the city’s homeless population. The program offers services and actions that promote dignity and social inclusion and ensure basic rights for people living in conditions of extreme vulnerability.
Since 2023, the service provided by FM has helped people in vulnerable situations secure hospital beds and schedule appointments in the state public network, and social assistance benefits. “During the actions, our Legal Medicine residents from the Faculty of Medical Sciences carry out medical examinations, followed by issuing an expert report. This report acts as a basis for the DPU to file lawsuits with the INSS (National Social Security Institute), ensuring that these individuals receive the benefits they are entitled to, especially the BPC-Loas [Continuous Welfare Benefit],” explains Ivan Dieb Miziara, professor in the Department of Legal Medicine, Bioethics, Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and coordinator of PopRua at FM.
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Strengthening citizenship
The project was awarded in the “practices aimed at strengthening citizenship by promoting legal, procedural, and institutional security for society in health demands” category and is part of the services carried out by the DPU in partnership with the Serviço Franciscano de Solidariedade (Sefras). Two days a week, staff members from the public defender’s office go to Chá do Padre, a community center that shelters and cares for homeless people in the city of São Paulo, to provide specialized assistance to the people who visit the place, supported by Sefras’ social services.
According to federal public defender Camila Taliberti Pereto Vasconcelos, who currently coordinates the DPU’s specialized services in São Paulo, one of the greatest difficulties for this public is the lack of access to medical professionals. “This population lacks personal and medical documents,” she says. According to the defender, medical care impacts health and access to various social benefits. “The medical documents are necessary for the DPU to file a lawsuit and increase the likelihood of a homeless person obtaining a favorable court ruling or even reaching an agreement with the INSS Federal Defender’s Office to obtain a benefit,” she says.
According to the defender, the practice reduces the number of lawsuits. “This is because, given the content of the medical report produced, the DPU has technical grounds for deciding not to bring the action in the event of a finding of incapacity or disability,” she explained. “In short, the action strengthens the citizenship of this section of the population, which is extremely vulnerable and has countless difficulties in accessing justice and legal aid,” she says.
Today, 31,884 homeless people live in the municipality of São Paulo (according to data from the 2021 Homeless Population Census), of which 12,675 are sheltered, and 19,209 live in public places or on the street. The Census also recorded the geographical distribution of this population, pointing out that—despite its high concentration in the Center region—it lives in various territories, spread across all regions of the city.
The Municipal Policies Plan for the Homeless Population of the Municipality of São Paulo (PopRua Plan) began in 2016, in the context of the National Policy for the Homeless People, to structure planning and monitoring for municipal policies aimed at this population group.
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*With information from HC-USP and Thays Rosário from the CNJ News Agency
English version: Nexus Traduções
