In the name of the father

Evandro Changas and the science of Manguinhos in 1930s Amazon

Abstract

The article analyzes Evandro Chagas’s role at the Institute of Experimental Pathology of the North (IPEN), founded by him in 1936 in Belém, Pará. Chagas, a researcher at the Oswaldo Cruz Institute and eldest son of renowned scientist Carlos Chagas, wanted to set up a research and teaching center in tropical medicine in the Amazon, one that could support state and federal health agencies in their efforts to combat the most relevant health problems in the region, such as leishmaniasis and malaria. Chagas used his scientific and social capital to introduce the Manguinhos institucional tradition in the Amazon – a tradition that bore the mark of his father and the eponymous disease. However, this took place in a setting where new political and institutional actors and structures, created in 1930, brought substantial changes to the field of public health and to the institutional framework of the Oswaldo Cruz Institute. By exploring the negotiations and conflicts that the scientist faced during this endeavor, we hope to contribute to a better understanding of the institutionalization of Brazilian science and public health in the Vargas era.