Poverty, Migration, and Chagas Disease

This article aims to review the different variables involved in the persistence of the different routes of transmission in endemic and non-endemic countries.Recent FindingsDespite the efforts made by the governments of Latin American countries to control Chagas disease under the coordination of the World Health Organization (WHO)/Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), there are still extensive areas where vector transmission is present due to different causes: colonization fronts and land-use change, human migration, deforestation, mining and industrial crops, among others. In the same way, the increase in environmental temperature accelerates the speed of vector transmission. On the other hand, human migration to non-endemic countries in search of better living conditions has changed the panorama of distribution of Chagas disease globally.SummaryGlobalization of Chagas disease has become a widespread public health and medical problem that requires to implement new prevention and control measures in non-endemic regions. The evidence shows that there are different factors involved in new epidemiological scenarios in endemic areas that require the implementation of strategies and policies to mitigate the transmission of the parasite to humans. Likewise, the implementation of health policies is required for the management and treatment of infected patients and to overcome barriers to access to available drugs.
Source: Current Tropical Medicine Reports - Category: Tropical Medicine Source Type: research