The Lancet: editorial sobre dengue no Rio de Janeiro

The Lancet aborda tema já aqui apresentado: a importância climática no aumento de casos de dengue (clique aqui) e, em editorial condena os governos brasileiros na três esferas pela epidemia no Rio de Janeiro. Leia abaixo.

International action needed on dengue The statistics on dengue have been getting increasingly alarming over the past few years with 2·5 billion people now living in areas that put them at risk of becoming infected with the virus. Yet the world seems unprepared to tackle this growing global epidemic, as the citizens of Rio De Janeiro know only too well. This year, almost 50000 people in this Brazilian State have been infected with the dengue virus and over 60 people have died. But the death toll is rising and the situation is causing public panic. Treatment of dengue with precise fluid and colloid correction can reduce the mortality rate from 5% to 1%. Such treatment needs to be given swiftly to prevent the devastating clinical consequences of dengue haemorrhagic fever and dengue shock. Yet local hospitals have been unprepared and three military field clinics have been opened to help ease the pressure on overcrowded emergency departments. The outbreak has also triggered an ugly display of finger pointing with President Lula de Silva, the State Governor, the State Minister of Health, and the city's Mayor all blaming each other for mishandling the crisis and for being ill-prepared. The doctors' union in Rio de Janeiro has also announced that it would press charges against the city, state, and federal governments for negligence in the prevention of, and fight against, dengue fever. Such accusations are unhelpful and detract from the effort to control dengue. Environmental experts and infectious disease specialists disagree over the role of climate change in the rise of dengue but everyone seems to agree that urbanisation is a contributing factor. And since 77% of the population of Latin America now lives in urban areas, and over half of the world's population will live in cities by 2050, an increasing number of dengue outbreaks is inevitable unless the international community takes urgent action. There is a pressing need for a comprehensive, coordinated, and cohesive international action plan to help affected countries tackle disease prevention and also to assist in the scale-up of immediate treatment to affected populations when outbreaks occur. The Lancet