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Revista Pan-Amazônica de Saúde

Print version ISSN 2176-6215On-line version ISSN 2176-6223

Abstract

COSTA, Zouraide Guerra Antunes; ROMANO, Alessandro Pecego Martins; ELKHOURY, Ana Nilce Maia  and  FLANNERY, Brendan. Historical development and evolution of epidemiological surveillance and control of yellow fever in Brazil. Rev Pan-Amaz Saude [online]. 2011, vol.2, n.1, pp.11-26. ISSN 2176-6215.  http://dx.doi.org/10.5123/S2176-62232011000100002.

In the past, yellow fever was a major scourge for the Brazilian population, one of the most dramatic public health problems in the country. Brazilian government has invested and achieved a major technical and scientific development, which finally led to the eradication of the urban transmission of the disease in Brazil, in 1 942, and influenced the campaign to eliminate Aedes aegypti in the Americas, in 1 958. The eradication of sylvaticyellow fever is impossible because it is a zoonosis of wild animals and Aedes aegypti has become widely spread in Brazil since the discontinuation of the continental elimination program; therefore its re-emergence in urban areas is a current threat. Although advances in medical sciences have not impacted on the disease's therapeutics in a specific manner, the development of the yellow fever vaccine has allowed its control, and has reduced the transmission levels of its sylvatic type to humans. This reduction and the combat against its urban vector have prevented the circulation of this virus in urban human populations in the Americas. This article casts a glance at the different ways this important public health problem has been confronted since its introduction to the Brazilian territory. It also covers the technical and scientific bases that underlie the actions at different moments of the past, the current status and the prospects for its control. Finally, it aims to analyze the evolution of the surveillance network of yellow fever in Brazil.

Keywords : Yellow Fever; History of Medicine; Public Health; Yellow Fever Vaccine; Epidemiologic Surveillance.

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