No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the author.
Cultural Politics and Medicine: Finding Chagas Disease in Early Twentieth Century Argentina
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any citations for this publication.
Analizamos el modo como los investigadores argentinos y brasileños, de fines del XIX e inicios del XX, construyeron sus programas de investigación referidos a las enfermedades tropicales. Aun cuando la higiene brasileña y argentina fueron herederas directas de los programas y principios pasteurianos, Brasil enfrentó sus problemas sanitarios con un nuevo programa de investigación donde se integraban la bacteriología, la parasitología y la preocupación con los vectores. Argentina, por su parte, desconsideró los problemas presentados por las enfermedades tropicales e insistió en reducir todos sus problemas sanitarios a aquellos que podían ser pensados en un paradigma donde se integraban los estudios microbiológicos y las estrategias "aeristas" propias de la higiene clásica.
This article analyzes aspects of the process of consolidation of a medical intelligentsia in Argentina during the last twenty years of the 19th century. It deals particularly with its link with the State through the Council of Hygiene, an institution charged with fixing health policy at the time. Thanks to the growing influence of these doctors, paradoxically closer to the Government but also more autonomous, the Council acquired during the period examined a set of new attributions at the national level, while at the same time it managed to give more attention to so-called internal health.
Este artículo analiza aspectos del proceso de consolidación de una intelligentzia médica en Argentina en los últimos veinte años del siglo XIX. Trata, sobre todo, de su vínculo con el Estado a través del Consejo de Higiene, institución encargada de fijar la política sanitaria del periodo. Gracias a la creciente influencia de estos médicos, paradójicamente más cercanos al gobierno a la vez que más autónomos, el Consejo adquirió durante el periodo reseñado un conjunto de nuevas atribuciones a nivel nacional, a la vez que consiguió prestar mayor atención a la llamada sanidad interna.
Este artículo realiza un análisis de la construcción de las patologías nacionales en Brasil y Argentina entre la primera y la cuarta década del siglo XX. Se considera el debate científico, social y político sobre el mal de Chagas y el bocio, así como las relaciones entre ese debate y la producción colectiva de la nacionalidad brasileña y argentina. En tal sentido, el "descubrimiento" de las patologías del interior significó en Brasil la generación de un proyecto sanitarista de proyección nacional, mientras que en Argentina tal situación se dio moderadamente, en la medida que la preocupación central estaba en las enfermedades consideradas producto de la "civilización", como responsabilidad de la inmigración extranjera.
In the one hundred years since the identification of Chagas disease, major changes have occurred in its scientific conception, institutional recognition, and political weight. From a medical perspective, it was seen as the cause of goiter, next its acute effects were emphasized, and then its effects on cardiac health received greater attention. In similar fashion, sanitary policy first downplayed the disease's importance, then elevated it to the role of a national cause, and gradually relegated it to the bottom of the agenda. The article briefly presents the key points of this historical trajectory in Argentina, exploring the cognitive, political, and institutional underpinnings of the disease as both a social and biological fact.
This article analyzes the discovery of Chagas disease and the parasite that causes it (Trypanosoma cruzi) by Carlos Chagas in 1908/1909, with a special focus on the scientific and social context in which this occurred. Its inclusion in the international debate on European tropical medicine--especially with researchers from the German school of protozoology--and its connection with discussions on the modernization of the recently established Brazilian Republic are also examined. The discovery of Chagas disease became a decisive aspect in the scientific project that Oswaldo Cruz sought to establish at the institute that bears his name. It was extolled as a symbol of Brazil's scientific ability t produce knowledge in line with the international scientific agenda, while simultaneously being attuned to the specific problems of the country.
Este artículo trata sobre un período de la historia argentina en el cual la
"mirada médica", a través de un grupo de prestigiosos intelectuales, se convirtió en una
clave de interpretación de la sociedad argentina. El análisis gira en torno a la obra de uno
de los médicos higienistas más influyentes, José María Ramos Mejía, deteniéndose especialmente
en su libro más famoso: Las multitudes argentinas (1899). La hipótesis principal
que recorre el texto es la siguiente: la medicalización de la sociedad, acentuada luego
de las epidemias de cólera y fiebre amarilla de mediados del siglo XIX, ofreció a las elites
públicas la posibilidad de construir dominios legítimos de intervención estatal.
Intromisiones del Estado en la vida privada que, además de ser algo resistidas por la
población, entraban en tensión con los principios teóricos del liberalismo que los propios
miembros de la elite defendían.
The article analyzes how Argentinean and Brazilian researchers designed their tropical disease research programs in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Even though Brazilian and Argentinean hygiene were direct descendants of Pasteurian programs and principles, Brazil addressed its public health problems through a new research agenda that embraced bacteriology, parasitology, and a concern with vectors. Argentina, on the other hand, disregarded the problems caused by tropical disease, insisting instead on reducing all of its health issues to those that could be approached through a paradigm embracing microbiology studies and the "aerista" strategies typical of classic hygiene.
Kim Pelis uses a wide range of French and Tunisian archival materials and a close reading of Nobel Prize-winning bacteriologist Charles Nicolle's scientific papers and philosophical treatises to explore the relationship of science and medicine to society and culture in the first third of the twentieth century.
Il fenomeno della partecipazione militare nella politica nazionale ha caratterizzato molteplici esperienze storiche del XX secolo latinoamericano. Esso tuttavia non si è prodotto con la stessa intensità e con le stesse modalità nei differenti paesi della regione. Attraverso l'analisi del caso argentino, l'autore indaga le cause storiche della crescita del potere delle forze armate utilizzando fonti militari fino ad oggi esaminate solo in maniera parziale. Ciò che emerge è un'inquietante relazione fra le scelte della dirigenza politica civile, le trasformazioni della cultura politica castrense e la capacità del corpo ufficiali di condizionare le scelte interne del paese, fino all'intervento diretto nella configurazione della forma statale.
François Delaporte's Chagas Disease chronicles Brazilian medicine's encounter with a disease, an insect, and a history of discovery. Between 1909 and 1911, Carlos Chagas described an infection (pathogenic trypanosome), its intermediate host, and the illness that he believed it caused, parasitic thyroiditis. Chagas's work did not lack significance: the disease that came to share his name would be one of Latin America's most serious endemic diseases. However, the clinical identification of the disease through "Romaña's sign" (a palpebral edema or swelling of the eyelid) some decades later marked a transformation in the general medical knowledge of the disease and its basis altogether. Not only was the disease entity that Chagas had described shown to be a nosological illusion, but twenty-five years of scientific controversy turned out to have been based on a misunderstanding. The continued use of the term "Chagas's Disease" even after Cecilio Romaña's discovery thus refers to a fundamental ambiguity. Delaporte dispels this ambiguity by re-examining the various discoveries, dead ends, controversies, and major epistemological transformations that marked the history of the disease--a history that begins with the creation of the Oswaldo Cruz Institute in Rio de Janeiro and ends in the forests of Santa Fe in northern Argentina. Delaporte's study shows how an epistemological focus can add depth to the history of medicine and complexity to accounts of scientific discovery.
Enemy in the Blood: Malaria, Environment, and Development in Argentina examines the dramatic yet mostly forgotten history of malaria control in northwest Argentina. Carter traces the evolution of malaria science and policy in Argentina from the disease's emergence as a social problem in the 1890s to its effective eradication by 1950. Malaria-control proponents saw the campaign as part of a larger project of constructing a modern identity for Argentina. Insofar as development meant building a more productive, rational, and hygienic society, the perceptions of a culturally backwards and disease-ridden interior prevented Argentina from joining the ranks of "modern" nations. The path to eradication, however, was not easy due to complicated public health politics, inappropriate application of foreign malaria control strategies, and a habitual misreading of the distinctive ecology of malaria in the northwest, especially the unique characteristics of the local mosquito vector. Homegrown scientific expertise, a populist public health agenda, and an infusion of new technologies eventually brought a rapid end to malaria's scourge, if not the cure for regional underdevelopment. Enemy in the Blood sheds light on the often neglected history of northwest Argentina's interior, adds to critical perspectives on the history of development and public health in modern Latin America, and demonstrates the merits of integrative socialenvironmental research. Copyright
A note on orthography and translation Introduction 1. The setting: the idea of the civilizing mission in 1895 and the creation of the government general 2. Public works and public health: civilization, technology, and science (1902-1914) 3. Forging the republican Sujet: schools, courts, and the attack on slavery (1902-1908) 4. 'En faire des hommes': William Ponty and the pursuit of moral progress (1908-1914) 5. Revolt and reaction: World War I and its consequences (1914-1930) 6. 'Democracy' reinvented: civilization through association (1914-1930) 7. Civilization through coercion: human Mise en Valeur in the 1920s Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index.
Trypanosoma cruzi, the cause of American trypanosomiasis, or Chagas disease, is a protozoan parasite that is enzootic and endemic in much of the Americas, where it infects a wide variety of wild and domestic mammals as well as many species of triatomine vectors, in addition to humans. Historically, vector-borne transmission of T. cruzi has been the most important mechanism through which humans have become infected with the parasite, but transmission by blood transfusion and congenital transmission also have been important. In many of the endemic countries transmission of T. cruzi has improved markedly in recent years as vector control and donor screening programs have been implemented on a widespread basis. In the United States autochthonous transmission of T. cruzi appears to be extremely rare. Five persons are known to have become infected with T. cruzi through organ transplants here, and prior to the implementation of blood donor screening in 2007 five instances of transmission by transfusion had been reported. Current estimates put the total number of T. cruzi-infected persons living in the United States at 300,000, essentially all of whom are immigrants from the endemic countries. The obstacles that stand in the way of the total elimination of T. cruzi transmission throughout the endemic range are economic and political, and no major technological advances are needed to accomplish this goal.
Whether considered a sublime landscape, malignant wilderness, or the endangered site of environmental conflicts, the tropics are, Picturing Tropical Nature argues, largely a construct of American and European imaginations. Nancy Leys Stephan asserts that images of the tropics conveyed through drawings, paintings, photographs, literature, and travel writings are central to what Stepan calls the âtropicalization of nature,â or the often harmful misrepresentation of the tropics and its peoples. She here examines several aspects of such tropicalization as they emerge through the work of nineteenth- and twentieth-century scientists and artists, including Alexander von Humboldt, Alfred Russel Wallace, Louis Agassiz, Sir Patrick Manson, and Margaret Mee. From the earliest photographic attempts to represent tropical hybrid races to depictions of disease in new tropical medicines, Picturing Tropical Nature offers new insight into the convergence of the tropics with European and American science and art. âA brilliant and provocative book . . . the kind of book that carries forward a field in a single stride . . . undoubtedly the finest account of âtropicalityâ we have.ââSocial History of Medicine
At the end of the 19th century, after having long neglected sanitary conditions in rural areas, Argentinean public health authorities began to recognize the need to combat malaria in the country's northern provinces. The disease was proliferating among workers in the sugarcane and cotton industries, jeopardizing national and international economic interests. The crusade against malaria involved co-operation of the Argentinean, Brazilian, European, and US scientists, whose concerted efforts led to identification of the local characteristics of the disease and its mosquito vector. Argentina's antimalaria campaigns also derived from international interactions, but 19th-century European models proved hard to supplant. This study illustrates how malaria was established as an issue of public concern in Argentina in the early 20th century, highlighting the disease's socioeconomic dimensions and exploring the role of international sanitary co-operation in paving the way for the establishment of a rural hygiene discourse.
This paper attempts to show how leading contemporary disciplines influenced the discovery of Chagas' disease and the formation of the early disease concept. Chagas was among the first generation of Brazilian trained scientists who incorporated modern principles of tropical medicine in its research. Thus, Chagas was familiar with characteristics of vector borne tropical diseases such as malaria and yellow fever. The detection of a hitherto unknown trypanosome in the gut of a reduviid bug prompted him to search for a related vector borne disease. Among the disciplines that were influential on Chagas' discovery and early disease description were pathology, entomology and parasitology. Parasitology as a new discipline was of crucial importance to tropical medicine and had a political dimension in the context of colonial medicine. Hence, leading scientists in tropical medicine were located in European countries and in the United States of America. One of these was the German Schaudinn School of Protozoology. The early description of American Trypanosomiasis can also be seen as a reflection of the Schaudinn School of Protozoology which dominated Chagas' scientific orientation towards parasitology with regard to the interpretation of the observed phenomena of the life cycle and the morphology and biology of T. cruzi. The first Chagas' disease concept was based on research of the biology and entomology of the trypanosome and its vector as well as on pathological studies of fatal cases. This concept was characterized by a confusion of some of the chronic forms of the disease, as iodine deficiency and goitre were endemic in some rural regions in Brazil. Therefore, early concepts of the disease faced strong opposition and even raised doubts about its existence.
Cronología de la enfermedad de Chagas
- Tálice
Historia de la enfermedad de Chagas en Argentina: evolución conceptual, institucional y política
- Zabala
Lucha contra las enfermedades infecto-contagiosas
- Anschütz
Liscia Desde fuera y desde dentro. Enfermedades, etnías y nación Hochman Di Liscia Palmer Patologías de la Patria
- S María
- Di
El orgullo de Charles Nicolle
- Mazza
Contribución al estudio de la enfermedad de Chagas o tripanosomiasis americana en la República Argentina
- Niño
Situación de la enfermedad de Chagas en los países del Cono Sur
- Medina
Carlos Chagas and the Discovery of Chagas Disease
- Lewinsohn
Higiene y demografía general
- Revilla
Reorganización del DNH
- Penna
Paludismo en Tucumán
- Correa
- Rock
Apuntes para la Historia de la Medicina Argentina
- Cornejo
Estadística censal y construcción de la Nación. El caso argentino, 1869-1914
- Otero
Ensayo histórico del orígen de la MEPRA
- Villagrán
Sobre focos de fiebre ondulante en Tucumán
- Mazza
Comprobación de enfermedad de Chagas en Añatuya
- Mazza
Plagues and Epidemics: Infected Spaces Past and Present
- Ilana Löwy
Historia Argentina. La república conservadora
- Ezequiel Gallo
Historia de la clase media argentina. Apogeo y decadencia de una ilusión, 1919–2003
- Ezequiel Adamovsky
Historia de las universidades argentinas
- Pablo Buchbinder
Vida Intelectual en el Buenos Aires Fin-De- Siglo (1880–1910) Derivas de la “cultura científica
- Oscar Terán
Cargos y designaciones
- Mazza