RESUMO
Chagas' disease (American trypanosomiasis) is endemic in nearly all Central and South American countries facing the Caribbean basin. Since 1960, reports from the islands of Aruba, Curaçao, Jamaica, and Trinidad have confirmed the presence of Trypanosoma cruzi, blood-sucking triatomine bugs, and wild animals infected with the parasite. It was also established that T. cruzi, triatomine bugs, infected wild animal reservoirs, and people with a positive serologic test for T. cruzi antibodies are to be found in Belize, the last country in Central America once thought to be free of Chagas' disease.
Assuntos
Doença de Chagas/epidemiologia , Animais , Belize , América Central , Criança , Vetores de Doenças , Humanos , Jamaica , Camundongos , Antilhas Holandesas , Ratos , América do Sul , Triatoma/microbiologia , Trinidad e Tobago , Trypanosoma cruzi/isolamento & purificação , Índias OcidentaisRESUMO
The serious threat posed by Chagas' disease demands an urgent and realistic approach to controlling the infection in multitudes of affected Latin American communities. Education is undoubtedly the best current means available for combating widespread public ignorance, both of the threat posed by reduviid bugs and of the association between the bugs and the disease. Especially high priority should be given to informing schoolchildren about the disease and to providing adults with an appropriate education on elementary hygiene and advice about how to make their homes secure against reduviid bug infestations. In general, the obstacles to control of Chagas' disease do not involve lack of a cure so much as lack of public awareness and education. A need thus exists for public health and education authorities to take an active interest in the implementation of control programs, and to make a determined effort to overcome existing difficulties by means of an educational approach.