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This paper addresses the issue of uncertainty in the measurements used in public health analysis and decision-making. The Shannon-Wiener entropy measure was adapted to express the uncertainty contained in counting causes of death in official vital statistics from Chile. Based on the findings, the authors conclude that metrological requirements in public health are as important as the measurements themselves. The study also considers and argues for the existence of uncertainty associated with the statistics' performative properties, both by the way the data are structured as a sort of syntax of reality and by exclusion of what remains beyond the quantitative modeling used in each case. Following the legacy of pragmatic thinking and using conceptual tools from the sociology of translation, the authors emphasize that by taking uncertainty into account, public health can contribute to a discussion on the relationship between technology, democracy, and formation of a participatory public.

This paper examines the main changes in the Chilean health system from the 1920s to the present, identifying contradictions, limits, and successes in terms of policy outcomes. Taking equity as the central theme, the analysis focuses on decisions made from the mid-1920s until 1973 in moving toward socialized medicine, with the sudden interruption of this process by the military coup in 1973. The author then discusses the set of regressive measures taken by authoritarian neoliberalism, with the help of Pinochet, to insert health into the market economy. Finally, the article analyzes efforts made by democratic administrations since 1990 to redress the legacy of socioeconomic inequalities, focusing on the commitment to rebuild the health care system with a new basis in equity, solidarity, and people's participation.