Yellow Fever Goes Back in Time and Brings a New Challenge to Brazil

02/22/2017 - 11h53

Cause of remarkable outbreaks in the Brazilian coast until the beginning of the 20th century, yellow fever is about to go back in time, with unpredictable consequences.

After entering Brazil by the coast in the 17th century, the virus was gradually "pushed" to the North and Midwest from the 1960s.

Cases in other regions were recorded casually.

In the last two decades, this picture began to change, with an expansion towards the coast.

With the current outbreak and the appearance of cases in Espírito Santo, the virus is settling in the Atlantic forest in an area with a large portion of the non-immunized population.

Since January, there have been 292 confirmed cases of the disease, according to the Ministry of Health, in the largest outbreak since the 1980s.

There are 249 cases in Minas Gerais, 39 in Espírito Santo and 4 in São Paulo. There are cases being investigated in Bahia, Rio Grande do Norte and Tocantins.

Territorial progress can be verified in maps showing risk and vaccination areas produced by the Ministry of Health based on the appearance of new cases in the country.

In 1997, the map of risk areas included the North and Midwest States and Maranhão.

In the following years, the boundaries gradually expanded to include Minas Gerais, west of Bahia and north of Sao Paulo. In part of these areas, there were cases in places where the disease had not been registered for four decades.

Now the vaccine recommendation map has been expanded again. In addition to the cities of Espírito Santo, it includes northern Rio and southern Bahia, with the objective of blocking the disease's progress.

According to the president of the Brazilian Society of Virology, Maurício Nogueira, it is possible to minimize the damage, but to prevent the spread of yellow fever will be difficult. "The virus will surely to dominate the entire Atlantic forest," he says.

According to him, after controlling the current outbreak, the country will have to discuss the possible inclusion of Rio in the vaccination area - today, only northern cities of the State are included. Vaccine production, however, would have to grow.

Translated by MARINA DELLA VALLE

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