Abril 2013
Jocelyn Raude, Reasearcher at EHESP School of Public Health and Inserm.Photo: Virginia Damas, Ensp/Fiocruz.
We interviewed Jocelyn Raude, co-chair of the Social Sciences Research Group of ZIKAlliance. The researcher has recently presented some of his findings about vector-borne diseases in the seminar “Zika, social sciences and humanites,” held on March 30th at Ensp/Fiocruz.
In this brief interview, Jocelyn pointed out the contributions of social sciences to the understanding of vector-borne diseases and highlighted that we know little about the role of beliefs and behaviors in response to a severe risk of infection.
The researcher also talked about his expectations in relation to the consortium ZIKAlliance and about the side-effects of health campaigns.
Which are the contributions of social sciences to the understanding of vector-borne diseases? Can you give us examples?
Social sciences can bring a variety of contributions to the understanding of vector-borne diseases. However, as we have limited time and resources to investigate the multiple aspects of these diseases, it is important in my opinion to focus our attention on a few critical aspects.
Firstly, one should prioritize some scientific questions that have to date been largely ignored or neglected by our peers. For example, from a psychosocial perspective, we still don’t know almost anything about the dynamic of health-related beliefs and behaviors in response to a severe risk of infection, and how they may contribute to the mitigation or amplification of the spread of these diseases within our societies.
Secondly, one has to consider the potential practical effects of our researches. Social scientists should also contribute to the emergence of solutions that help to preserve population health and well-being, and in particular the most vulnerable people, when our societies are faced to major threats.
Nisia Trindade Lima, president of Fiocruz and Jocelyn Raude. Both coordinate the Social Science Research Group of ZIKAlliance, an international research consortium gathering dozens of institutions and laboratories from Europe and Latin America. Photo: Virginia Damas, Ensp/Fiocruz.
Which are your expectations in relation to the project ZIKAlliance?
ZIKAlliance is a very ambitious program as it gathers dozens of institutions and laboratories from Europe and Latin America. That’s a challenge to make so many people from different countries working together to bring solutions to the public health problems induced by the dissemination of mosquito-borne diseases through the world.
My greatest expectation is that ZIKAlliance will make us better to prevent – or at least to significantly reduce the harmful consequences of future epidemics.
In your presentation at Fiocruz you have mentioned the side-effects of health interventions. Are there cases in which the negative effects outweighed the positive ones?
The adverse side-effects of pharmaceutical interventions are well-documented in various fields of medicine. That’s the reason why most treatments are subject to rigorous risk/benefit analyses before doctors are allowed to use them to treat some groups of patients.
Interestingly, in matter of non-pharmaceutical interventions, the adverse side-effects are often ignored, or considered non-existent despite some evidence of counter-intuitive effects.
For instance, it has been shown that providing low fat products to people tend to make them eating more food, and ultimately to consume more calories… The same kind of counter-intuitive effects have been found in Colorado in matter of mosquito-borne diseases control and prevention.
A successful program of vector reduction led to a substantial increasing of the cases of West-Nile virus infection, probably because people are likely to interrupt their personal protective health behaviors when the environmental pressure diminish.
In other words, the less people are bitted by mosquito, the more they abandon their health protective practices… To improve the public health interventions in the future, that’s necessary to better take into account this risk compensation effects.
Read more:
Zika virus spreads across Americas – in pictures
Brazil confirms links between zika virus and microcephaly in babies
Zika virus and rubella: similarities and differences – Researcher Ilana Löwy, from the Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Médicale Paris, traces a parallel between the current zika epidemics in Brazil and past rubella outbreaks.
Human sciences against zika – Researchers of the international consortium ZIKAlliance gathered at Fiocruz to discuss the social aspects of the disease, such as the effects of campaigns and sexual rights.
