Refounding from the South: Reflections on the Fourth Latin American and Caribbean Conference on Critical Health Thought

Abstract

The recent Fourth Latin American and Caribbean Conference on Critical Health Thought — held June 5–7, 2025, in Bogotá, Colombia — was a profoundly political, epistemic, and territorial experience unlike any before it. It is worth sharing some reflections on this space, which represents not only the continuation of a collective process, but also its maturation within an increasingly complex regional and global landscape.

Since its inception, the Latin American and Caribbean Conference on Critical Health Thought has been envisioned as an epistemological, political, and ethical commitment: to rethink health from the perspective of Latin America and the Caribbean, from our concrete realities, our struggles, and our peoples. It calls us to an urgent task: to contest the meaning of health — its governance, its models of care and attention, its structural determinants, and its civilizational horizons.