UTMB collaborates with Brazil to combat Zika virus

The Brazilian Ministry of Health announced a letter of intent on Friday to collaborate with the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) at Galveston to research and develop a Zika virus vaccine

The initiative of the collaborating will be directed toward the development of joint research effort to develop the vaccine as well as effective diagnostic tools and antiviral therapies.

The visit was coordinated by UTMB professors Mariano A. Garcia-Blanco and Pei-Young Shi from the department of biochemistry and molecular biology, along with Robert Tesh from the department of pathology. The delegation from Brazil was led by Professor Pedro Fernando da Costa Vasconcelos.

Brazil’s Ministry of Health has designated the Instituto Evandro Chagas’ National Reference Laboratory for Arbovirus as the coordinating entity for this joint effort. The institute is a collaborating center with the Pan American Health Organization and the World Health Organization.

UTMB Health is Texas’ first academic health center and comprises four health sciences schools, three institutes for advanced study, a research enterprise that includes one of only two national laboratories dedicated to the safe study of infectious threats to human health, a Level 1 trauma center, and a health system offering a full range of primary and specialized medical services throughout the Texas Gulf Coast region. It is part of the Texas Medical Center.