Key Points
A country where some hospitals rank alongside the Mayo Clinic and where others run out of basic medication for diabetes — that is the paradox captured by the latest global hospital ranking released this week.
The List
Newsweek’s World’s Best Hospitals 2026, produced in partnership with data firm Statista, evaluated over 2,500 hospitals across 32 countries. Seven Brazilian institutions made the global top 250. Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein led at 16th — making it the highest-ranked hospital in all of Latin America. Sírio-Libanês came in at 79th, followed by Hospital Alemão Oswaldo Cruz (105th), Moinhos de Vento (111th), HCor (146th), Hospital Santa Catarina Paulista (151st), and Hospital das Clínicas da USP (189th).
The global top five were Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Toronto General Hospital, Cleveland Clinic, Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm, and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. The 2026 edition added hospitals in the Philippines and Turkey for the first time and gave greater weight to quality metrics, which now account for 40% of each hospital’s score.
What the Ranking Shows — and What It Doesn’t
All seven Brazilian hospitals on the list are based in São Paulo, and all but one — Hospital das Clínicas, a public teaching hospital — are private or philanthropic institutions. That concentration tells a familiar story. Brazil’s healthcare system is split between the Unified Health System (SUS), which is free and theoretically covers all 215 million citizens, and a private sector that serves around 50 million people with insurance.
The gap between the two is enormous. Brazil is the only country with more than 200 million people to offer universal public healthcare. But the WHO ranks it 125th out of 190 countries for healthcare quality. The country spends about 9.5% of GDP on health, comparable to European averages in percentage terms, but per capita spending amounts to roughly $1,573 — less than a third of what Finland or Australia invest per person.
Meanwhile, public infrastructure is shrinking. Between 2010 and 2023, the number of inpatient beds in public hospitals fell from 335,000 to 309,000. Basic health units across the country frequently run short of medications for chronic conditions like hypertension and diabetes.
The Regional Picture
The physician-to-population ratio illustrates the divide within Brazil itself. State capitals in the southeast and south have ratios as high as ten doctors per thousand residents. Rural areas in the north and northeast often fall below 1.5. Specialized care is particularly scarce outside major cities, pushing patients into overcrowded emergency rooms.
Seven world-class hospitals in one city are a genuine achievement. They reflect decades of investment, clinical talent, and institutional ambition. But they also reveal a system where excellence and deprivation coexist within the same national borders — sometimes within the same city. For most Brazilians, the Newsweek list describes a healthcare system they will never access.