With a new government in place since January and a woman, Dilma Rousseff, at the helm, together with an economic growth rate of 7·5% last year and a newly discovered oil field off its coast, Brazil is a country in demand as a political and economic partner. Brazil now has an important and timely opportunity to cement its formidable health achievements towards its ultimate goal of universal, equitable, and sustainable health care to fulfil the right to health enshrined in its 1988 constitution. To highlight this opportunity, The Lancet is publishing a Series of six papers that critically examine what the country's policies have achieved and where future challenges might lie.