Brazil trains nine Latin American countries in the diagnosis of coronavirus
Brazil, which declared maximum health alert despite the fact that it has not yet confirmed any case of coronavirus, the pathogen causing an epidemic that has already spread to 25 countries, offered training in the diagnosis of this disease to technicians from nine Latin American countries .
The technical training course, started on Thursday and which will end on Friday, was offered by specialists from the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), the largest health research center in Latin America and under the Ministry of Health, this portfolio reported.
The representatives of Colombia, Uruguay, Argentina, Panama, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru were instructed in techniques to diagnose the coronavirus in the laboratory thanks to a cooperation project led by the Ministry of Health of Brazil and the Pan American Organization of the Health (OPAS).
The technicians were instructed to diagnose the coronavirus in real time using RT-PCR technology, capable of detecting the genome of the virus in different samples and whose inputs have already been distributed by OPAS in several countries of the region.
"Brazil has one of the most solid and prepared surveillance networks for respiratory viruses in Latin America. The training of other countries is an important step in the implementation of a specific diagnostic protocol in Latin America," explained the regional adviser of the OPAS for Viral Diseases, Jairo Méndez.
The same course had been taught last week to specialists from the different public reference laboratories in the diagnosis of diseases in Brazil, such as the Evandro Chagas Institute and the Adolfo Lutz Institute.
The Fiocruz Respiratory Virus Laboratory has been integrating the network of national influenza centers of the World Health Organization (WHO) for more than sixty years and is considered a reference in Latin America.
In a press conference he gave this Thursday, Brazilian Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta said that Brazil will be in solidarity with its neighbors in the fight against the coronavirus, especially with Venezuela, which is the one that most needs help right now.
"We have to be supportive. Paraguay, for example, has many difficulties with the laboratories and we authorize the samples of its suspicious patients to be examined here," he said.
"Argentina and Uruguay have a good structure. We are concerned about Venezuela because of the dismantling of its health system, which has already resulted in epidemics of diphtheria and measles. That is why we are going to do surveillance work in association with the OPAS, which dialogues with the Venezuelan government, "he added.
Although it has no confirmed case of coronavirus and only investigates nine suspects, Brazil declared maximum alert of its health system to be able to repatriate 34 Brazilians who are isolated in Wuhan, the Chinese city epicenter of the epidemic, and whose arrival at Country is scheduled for Saturday.
The Government sent two planes of the Brazilian Presidency to China with the mission of repatriating 34 citizens who have asked for help in the face of the health emergency and who will be subjected to an 18-day quarantine at an Air Force base in Anápolis, a nearby municipality to Brasilia.
The epidemic in Wuhan has caused at least 564 deaths in China and one in the Philippines, and infected 28,060 in China and another 225 in 24 other countries where cases have been recorded, although without the virulence with which it has manifested itself in that Asian nation
