The legitimacy of state intervention in the advertising of products subject to health surveillance

Abstract

This essay aims at analysing the ethical role of the State, through the National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa), in regulating the advertisement of products that may negatively impact on the population's health. From the references of Intervention Bioethics - utilitarian perspective that considers critical and supportive social relations of production and the inter-human relations giving the state the role of protector of the interests of individuals who are in conditions of vulnerability - was performed an analysis of the market ideology that sustains a speech contrary to public policy.The present work focuses on six emblematic cases related to the matter: smoking products, alcoholic beverage, medicines, food for lactant women, food in general and food for children. It presents an analysis of the free market ideology that backs the argument against public intervention. The methodology used in this inquiry is the interpretation of legal texts, which corresponds to interpreting the country's legal framework, linking the obtained data with the object of the actual work: state intervention (or non-intervention) in the advertisement of products subject to surveillance. The essay concludes that state intervention is legitimate when aimed at protecting users, who are always vulnerable in this unilateral consumer relationship.