Chagas Disease in the Pontal do Paranapanema Region

• Grant number: 07/08705-2
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: March 01, 2008
• End date: October 31, 2009
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Geography
• Principal Investigator: Raul Borges Guimarães
• Grantee: Guttierre Paschoa Catrolio da Silva
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia (FCT). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Presidente Prudente. Presidente Prudente , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The objective of this project is to analyse some of the ecological aspects of American Trypanosomiasis: the substitution, persistence and colonization potential of allochthonous and autochthonous triatomine bugs. The project will also analyse the urbanization phenomenon of the triatomine vectors of Chagas' disease in Pontal do Paranapanema Region considering to the evidence that the same process may be underway throughout urban areas of the entire Geo-epidemiological Corridor. For this, it will be necessary to use entomologic indicators of the vectors in the urban areas of the main cities of the region. In each case, the introduction of the Trypanosomiasis infestans in the urban area will be analysed, considering the ambient modifications that could be incriminated as responsible by this process. The theoretical target of the work bases in the analysis of the occurrence of diseases related with the ambient disequilibria provoked by the occupation human being in the territory and the consequent adaptation of vectors, its focus and its forms of operation in the new modalities of pathogenic complexes, or either, those that if had developed according to standards conducted for the technician-scientific way and the informational flows. The complex calls techno-pathogenic informational if organize according to systems of determinative factors, strong influenced for the technological traces of the current society and if they correlate to the system of attention of the health. The information, present system in such a way in the society as in the natural environment, acts for interaction, but also, "penetrates" in the other structures, dominating the processes through the accumulation of data, in the programmed action and forms of constant regulation. The pathogenic complex that results of this informational integration is more agile than the ones that precedes it in the time, a time that its main problems become related with the necessity to keep the homeostatic balance and to prevent drastic alterations. The disease, which is endemic in the Andean mountain valleys of Cochabamba, in the region of Yungas, Bolivia, was dispersed to Argentina and Brazil by human carriers. Passing through the scrublands of Brazil's centre-west region, the disease eventually arrived in Brazil's populous north-eastern region. Adjusting to the new environment, the triatomine bugs eventually adapted and established colonies in various residences. As north easterners migrated toward the southern zones of South America, they helped broaden the distribution of the disease in Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay, and Argentina. Currently, the Minas Gerais-San Juan Geo-epidemiological Corridor presents some common challenges. They are: 1) the risk that native species will substitute the externally introduced T. infestans; 2) the persistence of infestation in areas that have been continually submitted to chemical control; and 3) the growing importance of prevention at the secondary level.