Enforcing the right to health in private health systems through Judicialization what can we learn from the scoping review of the cross-national perspective?

•The participation of the private sector in healthcare does not negate the public character of healthcare systems.•The Judicialization of health complicates the scope of health policies and may limit health policy management.•The Judicialization of health in private healthcare systems is often determined by socioeconomic context, enforceability of the right to health in the national legal framework, regulation, and the nature of the healthcare system.•Healthcare system bases must include responsibility, solidarity, equity, and distributive justice.•The search strategy yielded a total of 464 articles. After screening and applying the inclusion and exclusion criteria, a final count of 30 articles were included. Private sector acting in healthcare does not remove the public nature of a health system, nor mitigate the right to health as a human right. This scoping review aims to answer the question: what factors influence the pattern of lawsuits seeking to enforce the right to health in private healthcare systems? The search was carried out in Pubmed, SciELO, DOAJ and Scopus. Out of 464 articles found, after inclusion and exclusion criteria, 30 articles were included. The survey covered 36 different countries and four main factors were identified. The socioeconomic context, the health system model, the incorporation of the right to health in legislation, and the model of regulation of private health. Understanding these patterns help understanding the difficulties of implementing and guaranteeing universal health. Health systems must be based on responsibility, solidarity, equity, and distributive justice, since the sum of these values generates mutualism. Judicial decision-making regarding to health access must be reasoned on equity and distributive justice, scientific evidence and ethical factors. Even private health systems must be funded in a well-defined ethical platform and social moral valuation.