As part of the set of strategic actions to combat arboviruses and the increase in dengue cases in Brazil, the Ministry of Health begins, this Friday (2/16), a study to evaluate the effectiveness of the vaccine in the adult population. The initiative will take place in Guaratiba, West Zone of Rio de Janeiro. The survey will immunize 20,000 volunteers ranging from 18 to 40 years of age, residents of the region and with active registration in one of the 10 local Primary Care units. The aim is to compare the incidence of symptomatic dengue infection in a vaccinated group with the incidence among unvaccinated people. With this, it will be possible to measure the effectiveness of the immunizer in preventing symptomatic cases of dengue caused by any serotype. The study, carried out in partnership with Fiocruz and the Municipal Health Department of Rio de Janeiro, will offer new scientific evidence to support decision-making in the vaccination of other audiences approved by the National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa), from 4 to 60 years old.
The proposal was presented to the federal government by the city's Health Department, which, by lottery, selected the months of birth May, August, October and November as the criteria for defining the participants. Residents of Guaratiba, Barra de Guaratiba, Pedra de Guaratiba and Ilha de Guaratiba born in the four months drawn are eligible to participate in the research. People who are pregnant or breastfeeding, if they have contracted dengue in the last six months, if they have immunosuppression problems or if they have received blood products in the last three months will not be able to participate. Volunteers will be followed up monthly electronically, for active monitoring, over the next two years. Check the list of eligible populations on the website of the City of Rio de Janeiro.
Vaccines will be administered in a staggered manner and the first to be served will be the eligible users registered at CMS Mourão Filho, in the neighborhood of Barra de Guaratiba. The action is associated with the study already in progress in the city of Dourados, in Mato Grosso do Sul, which began on January 3. There is also a national survey of vaccine effectiveness, developed by Fiocruz Bahia, in addition to other studies being analyzed by the Department of Health and Environmental Surveillance. The partnership between the Ministry of Health and the city of Rio de Janeiro also involves researchers from the University of Brasília (UnB), under the coordination of the Evandro Chagas National Institute of Infectious Diseases (INI/Fiocruz).
The Ministry of Health has also developed an active pharmacovigilance strategy, cross-referencing dengue notification data from the Notifiable Diseases Information (Sinan), Hospital Information (SIH) and Mortality Information (SIM) systems with individualized vaccination data. The ministry has reference laboratories to identify and sequence dengue virus serotypes, such as those at INI/Fiocruz and the Adolfo Lutz Institute.
Source: Fiocruz News Agency (AFN).
