Universal access to health public services was established in Brazil 32 years ago. However, health technology assessment (HTA) as a requirement for the decision-making process in the Unified Health System (SUS) was defined only in 2011 with the National Committee for Health Technology Incorporation of the SUS (Conitec), which advises the Ministry of Health on the decision to incorporate health technologies into the SUS. All of Conitec’s recommendations are based on the best available scientific evidence regarding efficacy, effectiveness, and safety of a technology, but also include economic evaluation studies of these technologies, developed from the perspective of the SUS. Considering this an estimate of the population eligible for use of the technology under evaluation, if it is incorporated into the SUS, it is considered in the decision-making process.

This descriptive study, based on open access data from Conitec’s website, aimed at identifying the estimated number of patients potentially benefitting by the recommendations published in 2022, from January to November. Since each report includes an estimate for the first five years of incorporation of the technologies, all data were collected to check whether population growth was considered.

Finally, 38 recommendation reports were identified, with 28 reports on incorporation and 10 reports for expansion of technology use. Among them, they related to 31 medicines and seven procedures or products. In the first year after incorporating the listed technologies, a total of 7,767,321 potential beneficiary patients were estimated, while over five years the total number would increase to approximately 7,967,874 patients. There were recommended drugs for rare diseases whose benefited population did not exceed the estimate of 10 patients per year; as an example is cerliponase alfa for treating neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis. In another example, an estimate of 4,494,539 women would benefit by incorporated contraceptives into the SUS.

This study describes how accessible public health is becoming, meeting more health policies, showing potential to benefit more patients every day and showing what trends can be expected in the future.