One of the 4 pillars of the
World Health Organization (
WHO) strategy for the prevention and control of
snake bite envenomings is to ensure safe and effective pharmacotherapeutic
treatments [1]. The mainstay in the
pharmacotherapy of these envenomings, as well as of envenomings by
scorpions and
spiders, is the timely
administration of safe and effective
antivenoms [2,3].
Antivenoms are composed of
immunoglobulins, or
immunoglobulin fragments, purified from the
plasma of
animals, usually
horses, immunized with
venoms. Currently, there is an urgent need to improve
antivenom availability, accessibility, and
affordability on a global basis, particularly for use in
sub-Saharan Africa,
Asia, and
Latin America [1]. There is a long tradition in
snake,
scorpion,
spider, and, more recently, caterpillar
antivenoms production in
Latin America, especially centered in public manufacturing
laboratories in
Argentina,
Brazil,
Peru,
Bolivia,
Ecuador,
Colombia,
Venezuela,
Costa Rica, and
Mexico [4–6]. A network of public
laboratories devoted to the
production and
quality control of
antivenoms was established in this region in the last decade [4,5], which has recently led to the creation of the Latin American Network of Public
Antivenom Manufacturing
Laboratories (RELAPA, Red Latinoamericana de Laboratorios Públicos Productores de Antivenenos) [6]. RELAPA aims at consolidating
governance mechanisms within a regional platform for
technical cooperation,
technology transfer,
research, and
training for the regional improvement of
antivenom availability, under the coordination of the
Pan American Health Organization (
PAHO) and its office Centro Panamericano de Fiebre Aftosa (
Panaftosa). As part of the ongoing activities of RELAPA, a
survey was sent by
PAHO/
Panaftosa to the institutions integrating this network to assess the situation of
antivenom manufacture in these
laboratories during the period January 2020 to July 2020, with the
goal of analyzing in which ways has
antivenom production been affected in this extraordinary year, especially regarding the impact of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)
pandemic, which has profoundly stricken
Latin America [7]. The
survey was sent to the directors of the institutions of RELAPA (the list of institutions is detailed in Fan and colleagues [6]). The
survey included the following aspects (a) What was the demand and the
production of
antivenoms (including
snake,
scorpion,
spider, and caterpillar
antivenoms) during the period January 2020 to July 2020? (b) What was the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic in (i) the number of professional and technical staff working to manufacture
antivenom, (ii) acquisitions of consumables and
laboratory equipment, (iii) overall
budget devoted to
antivenom manufacture, and (iv)
attention to the COVID-19 crisis in terms of development of
therapeutic equine preparations against
Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (
SARS-CoV-2), preparation of diagnostic
reagents,
quality control activities, or assignment of staff to attend other
pandemic issues? (c) Which are the priorities of the
laboratories in the near
future regarding regional cooperation in the field of
antivenom manufacture and
quality control? The
survey was carried out between October 1 and October 19, 2020, using the platform Qualtrics (Qualtrics XM Platform, Seattle,
Washington, United States of America).