{"id":422819,"date":"2022-02-23T17:04:55","date_gmt":"2022-02-23T20:04:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/?p=422819"},"modified":"2022-02-23T17:04:55","modified_gmt":"2022-02-23T20:04:55","slug":"in-the-spotlight-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/in-the-spotlight-2\/","title":{"rendered":"In the spotlight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brazil is one of the ten countries most frequently referenced in scientific publications about COVID-19 around the world. Up to mid-November, there were 2,221 mentions in papers authored by national and foreign groups. The papers address aspects related to the mechanisms and dynamics of transmission of the novel coronavirus (Sars-CoV-2), as well as prevention, diagnosis, and treatment strategies, among other topics. The numbers are provided by LitCovid<\/a>, a repository created by engineers and data scientists at the United States National Library of Medicine (NLM), which is a collection of more than 190,000 papers on the pandemic.<\/p>\n

The platform uses machine learning algorithms to sift through the thousands of documents published every day in journals indexed by PubMed\u2014the world\u2019s largest database of articles and books in the field of human health\u2014and identify those that specifically address COVID-19. Each selected item receives a score that indicates how likely it is to be relevant; papers categorized as irrelevant are then discarded. Then, using automated text classification systems, the tool scrutinizes the summaries of each paper, separating them into distinct categories and by country of mention.<\/p>\n

China has been mentioned in 14,648 COVID-19\u2013related papers over the past two years. The United States, United Kingdom, Italy, and India follow, with 13,627, 5,455, 5,399, and 3,901 mentions, respectively. The 2,221 papers that reference Brazil were mostly articles describing and analyzing political, social, and environmental factors related to the spread of Sars-CoV-2 in different regions of the country and the impacts of COVID-19 on specific populations and groups. These are studies on the prevalence of the novel coronavirus among healthcare professionals on the front lines of the pandemic in a specific city or state, or covering the effects of the disease in pediatric, ophthalmic, and cancer patients. \u201cIt was as if everyone wanted to contribute in some way to the knowledge that was being built around the world about the pandemic,\u201d says physicist Haroldo Ribeiro, from the State University of Maring\u00e1, in Paran\u00e1, who studies Brazil\u2019s scientific production. Brazil has generated quality articles, especially in the field of virology. One of the papers considered most relevant by LitCovid was published in Science<\/em> in April 2021 by the team led by physician Ester Sabino, from the University of S\u00e3o Paulo School of Medicine (FM-USP). The study identified the P1 variant in Manaus and confirmed that the second COVID-19 outbreak in that city was associated with that variant.<\/p>\n

As vaccination efforts began to advance in the nation, many groups sought to estimate its effects on populations from different regions and age groups, as well as its effectiveness against certain strains of Sars-CoV-2. One of the papers that stood out was published in July 2021 in The Lancet Microbe<\/em>. Led by virologist Jos\u00e9 Luiz Proen\u00e7a M\u00f3dena, from the University of Campinas (UNICAMP), the paper assessed whether the immune responses caused by Corona-Vac\u2014developed by the Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac Biotech and produced in Brazil by the Butantan Institute of S\u00e3o Paulo\u2014and those resulting from COVID-19 infection were able to neutralize P1. \u201cThis study was carried out in a context of great concern involving new variants,\u201d shares virologist Fernando Spilki, from Feevale University, in Rio Grande do Sul, one of the authors of the article.<\/p>\n

He says that some studies had observed that variants B.1.1.7, first detected in the UK, and B.1.351, identified in South Africa, were able to partially evade the antibody response in individuals who had been previously infected and in those who were had been vaccinated. \u201cWe wanted to know if the same was true for P1 in relation to CoronaVac,\u201d explains Spilki. The scientists identified a decrease in the ability of antibodies induced by this vaccine to block the multiplication of P1 over time; this was also true for other vaccines. \u201cThis finding was confirmed in the papers by infectious disease expert Julio Croda, from FIOCRUZ (Oswaldo Cruz Foundation), which highlighted the importance of the COVID-19 vaccine booster shot.\u201d<\/p>\n\n \n \n \n <\/picture>Alexandre Affonso<\/span>\n

According to Spilki, Brazil\u2019s genomic surveillance capacity was built thanks to experiences involving other viruses, such as dengue, chikungunya, yellow fever, and Zika. \u201cBrazil boasts a highly qualified community of researchers in the areas of molecular virology and epidemiology, which was ready to respond when the new coronavirus pandemic took hold across the country,\u201d points out the researcher. \u201cIt could have been better leveraged had more money been invested in science in recent years.\u201d<\/p>\n

There were also many papers reporting cases, such as those on individuals who were reinfected with the new coronavirus or who caught COVID-19 and some other disease at the same time, such as dengue and Chagas. Many also included letters and opinion pieces pointing out errors and negligence by the federal government in its handling of the pandemic. One of the most significant publications was the May 2020 editorial in The Lancet<\/em>, which highlighted the seriousness of the pandemic in Brazil and criticized President Jair Bolsonaro, calling him \u201cthe greatest threat to Brazil\u2019s COVID-19 response.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because they are restricted to specific contexts and offer incremental contributions, several papers produced by Brazilian groups have been published in low-impact journals. \u201cThe data reflects a characteristic phenomenon in Brazil,\u201d highlights epidemiologist Pedro Hallal, from the Federal University of Pelotas (UFPEL), in Rio Grande do Sul. \u201cWe produce many articles, but they do not have a high international impact.\u201d LitCovid data also indicates that the periods with the highest number of COVID-19 papers referencing Brazil were August and September 2020, and June and July 2021, precisely during the most acute phases of the first and second waves of the pandemic across the nation. One of the most relevant papers published at that time is Epicovid-19, the first and most comprehensive population survey on the incidence of the new coronavirus carried out in Brazil. The study was led by the UFPEL Epidemiological Research Center and monitored the progression of the Sars-CoV-2 pandemic in 133 Brazilian cities in different periods. \u201cIt was one of the largest epidemiological studies conducted, with data collected directly from people\u2019s homes,\u201d says Hallal, one of the scientists behind the survey, which was funded by FAPESP in its last phase of data collection. He explains that the study provided a detailed picture of the spread of the virus, showing, for example, that the loss of, or changes in, the sense of smell and taste were symptoms of the disease.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brazil is one of the most referenced countries in publications about the disease","protected":false},"author":346,"featured_media":422474,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3674,166],"tags":[215],"coauthors":[662],"class_list":["post-422819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-covid-19-en","category-policies-st-en","tag-scientometrics","keywords-coronavirus-en","keywords-covid-19-en","keywords-sars-cov-2-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/346"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=422819"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422819\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":425463,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422819\/revisions\/425463"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/422474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422819"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=422819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}