Publications by authors named "Alessandra A Borges"

Article Synopsis
  • * A study analyzing the Notifiable Diseases Information System (SINAN) from 2001 to 2021 found 1,444 cases of acute CD in Northeast Brazil, with significant notification drops in the second period of the study.
  • * The majority of cases involved Afro-Brazilian adults, with a shift in infection routes from mainly vector-borne transmission in the first period to oral transmission in the second, highlighting ongoing public health challenges in the region.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Orthobunyavirus oropouche ense virus (OROV), the causative agent of Oropouche fever, is widely dispersed in Brazil and South America, causing sporadic outbreaks. Due to the similarity of initial clinical symptoms caused by OROV with other arboviruses found in overlapping geographical areas, differential diagnosis is challenging. As for most neglected tropical diseases, there is a shortage of reagents for diagnosing and studying OROV pathogenesis.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Mayaro virus is an emerging arbovirus that causes nonspecific febrile illness or arthralgia syndromes similar to the Chikungunya virus, a virus closely related from the family. MAYV outbreaks occur more frequently in the northern and central-western states of Brazil; however, in recent years, virus circulation has been spreading to other regions. Due to the undifferentiated initial clinical symptoms between MAYV and other endemic pathogenic arboviruses with geographic overlapping, identification of patients infected by MAYV might be underreported.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) causes a self-limiting disease characterized by the onset of fever, skin rash and persistent arthralgia. In the last decade, it has emerged as a serious public health problem causing several outbreaks around the world. Here, we report the CHIKV genotype characterization during the 2016 CHIKV outbreak in Alagoas State, Brazil.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome (HCPS) is rare in Northeastern Brazil.

Methods: Prospective surveillance was conducted over a two-year period in Alagoas State, Northeastern Brazil. The prevalence of anti-hantavirus N-antigen IgM and IgG in human serum samples was determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay testing.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome is a severe human disease associated with hantavirus infection. The clinical course of illness varies greatly among individuals, possibly due to viral and immunological elements and the influence of host genetic factors on clinical outcome. As the magnitude of immune activation has been associated with disease severity, polymorphisms in genes involved in the immune response that may affect the development of this syndrome were investigated.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Rodent-borne hantaviruses cause severe human diseases. We completed a serological survey of hantavirus infection in rural inhabitants of Turvo County, in the southern State of Santa Catarina, Brazil, in which seropositivity for hantavirus was correlated to previous disease in the participants.

Methods: The levels of IgG antibodies to hantavirus Araraquara in the sera of 257 individuals were determined using an immunoenzymatic assay.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: The aim of this study was to investigate the incidence of adverse effects and protective effects from influenza vaccine among elderly individuals who were vaccinated through the public healthcare system in the municipality of Tubarão, State of Santa Catarina.

Methods: A prospective cohort study was conducted between May and September 2008. A group of 341 patients was recruited, among whom 289 had been vaccinated through the public system (VSUS) and 52 had not been vaccinated (NV).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Hantavirus pulmonary and cardiovascular syndrome (HPCS) is an emerging serious disease in the Americas. Hantaviruses (Bunyaviridae) are the causative agents of this syndrome and are mainly transmitted through inhalation of aerosols containing the excreta of wild rodents. In the Ribeirão Preto region (state of São Paulo, Brazil), HPCS has been reported since 1998, caused by the Araraquara virus (ARAV), for which Necromys lasiurus is the rodent reservoir.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Activation of the immune response in hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome (HCPS) leads to a high TNF production, probably contributing to the disease. The polymorphic TNF2 allele (TNF -308G/A) has been associated with increased cytokine production. We investigated the association of the TNF2 allele with the outcome of hantavirus infection in Brazilian patients.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Pulmonary and cardiovascular syndrome due to hantavirus is a disease caused by inhalation of aerosols from the excreta of wild rodents contaminated by viruses of the Bunyaviridae family. We studied the clinical and laboratory manifestations of 70 cases that occurred in the region of Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brazil, between 1998 and 2007. The frequency of symptoms was as follows: dyspnea (87%), fever (81%), coughing (44%), headache (34%), tachycardia (81%), low arterial blood pressure (56%), metabolic acidosis (57%), lymphocytopenia (51%), hematocrit > 45% (70%), leukocytosis with left deviation (67%), creatinine (51%) and urea (42%).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Laboratory diagnosis of hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome (HCPS) in Brazil has been performed mostly by detection of IgM antibodies to recombinant antigen purified from Sin Nombre virus and Andes virus (ANDV). Recently, a recombinant nucleocapsid (rN) protein of Araraquara virus (ARAV), a Brazilian hantavirus, was obtained in Escherichia coli. To evaluate ARAV rN as antigen for antibody detection, serum samples from 30 patients from Argentina seropositive for hantavirus were tested.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) is an increasing health problem in Brazil because of encroachment of sprawling urban, agricultural, and cattle-raising areas into habitats of subfamily Sigmodontinae rodents, which serve as hantavirus reservoirs. From 1993 through June 2007, a total of 884 cases of HPS were reported in Brazil (case-fatality rate 39%). To better understand this emerging disease, we collected 89 human serum samples and 68 rodent lung samples containing antibodies to hantavirus from a 2,500-km-wide area in Brazil.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: Hantaviruses are rodent-borne RNA viruses that have caused hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome in several Brazilian regions. In the present study, geographical distribution, seroprevalence, natural host range, and phylogenetic relations of rodent-associated hantaviruses collected from seven counties of Southeastern Brazil were evaluated.

Methods: ELISA, RT-PCR and phylogenetic analysis were used in this study.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The prevalence and potential zoonotic transmission of group C rotavirus (RVC) were examined by testing fecal samples collected from children during a longitudinal study that was carried out in the outskirts of Belém, Brazil, from December 1982 to March 1986. The study involved a group of 30 children who were followed from birth to 3 years. Of the 77 samples tested from 29 children, 5 (6.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) is an emerging syndrome in the Americas. The disease results from intense immune activation and changes in vascular permeability. The aim of this study was to determine the profile of serum cytokines in HPS patients looking for correlation with the clinical parameters, severity and outcome of illness.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Induced sputum is a useful technique for assessing airway inflammation, but its role in the diagnosis of lung disease in immunosuppressed patients needs further investigation. This study compared the use of induced sputum and BAL in the diagnosis of pneumocystosis, in HIV patients. From January 1, 2001, to December 30, 2002, HIV-positive patients older than 14 were evaluated at a hospital in Florianópolis, Santa Catarina, Brazil.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Despite clinical evidence of myocardial dysfunction, there is no pathological evidence of myocardial injury in hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS). The dominant opinion is that the primary cardiac lesion is functional rather than structural. The present study describes hantaviral antigen and particles in the cardiac endothelium and interstitial macrophages in association with a typical myocarditis in HPS.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Hantaviruses are emerging viruses in the Americas that cause cardiopulmonary syndrome with high lethality. The intense cellular immune response to hantavirus alters normal endothelial cell barrier functions and seems to be harmful to the host. On the other hand, the humoral immune response seems to be essential for recovery from infection.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF