Introduction: Encephalon malignant neoplasia (EMN) is a harmful type of cancer and its most aggressive phenotypes lead to the demise of patients in 12-18 months despite the use of state-of-the-art therapies, which remain inefficient and expensive for patients, families and health systems. Objectives: The aim of this work was to analyze the expenditures of the Brazilian Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS), the national public health system, on EMN patients compared to all neoplasia patients over a span of ten years (2008 to 2017). Methodology and resources: Monthly data were collected from the SUS data base DATASUS from 2008 to 2017 and analyzed with regard to EMN and general neoplasia for the following categories: value of total expenditures; number of hospitalizations; mean value of hospitalizations; mean of monthly permanence time and death rate. Results: More than 0.3% of SUS costs were directed to EMN patients, although they represented 0.1% of total hospitalizations. The mean value of hospitalization of EMN patients was almost 80% that of general neoplasia patients and hospitalization time was twice that of general neoplasia patients. Moreover, EMN patients had a death rate almost four times higher than that of general neoplasia patients. Discussion and conclusion: EMN therapies remained expensive and lacked efficacy in the time period under analysis, with a disproportionate share of SUS expenditure being dedicated to these patients. Improving the effectiveness of treatment requires drug repurposing and adjuvant chemotherapy—in addition to radiotherapy and the use of monoclonal antibodies.Keywords: Encephalon malignant neoplasia; Cancer treatment costs; SUS.