Euforia e desencanto: representações sociais sobre estreptomicina e tuberculose na imprensa brasileira nas décadas de 1940 e 1950

Abstract

This research focuses on the historical trajectory of tuberculosis and, specifically, on a drug, streptomycin, which represented the first possibility of cure for tuberculosis patients. It aims to revisit some important events in Brazil, from the first news of the discovery of the drug, in 1943, and its developments until the end of the 1950s, establishing relationships between the different aspects in relation to the new antibiotic, always starting from news of the press: the social agents involved in the process of receiving streptomycin in Brazil, the opinion of the medical profession regarding the novelty of the drug, the issues involving its import and production by the pharmaceutical industry since 1950, the assistance and distribution of the drug, the struggle of the patients for the right to purchase the medicine, as well as the public policies of the time for the access of antibiotics by the population. From the newspaper articles, in the established time frame, it is possible to establish a narrative of the event, the advent of streptomycin. In the light of Moscovici's theory, the social representations constructed by this communication vehicle will be analyzed, the meanings attributed to the medicine, in order to apprehend the constitutive processes of social representations and their effectiveness in social engendering, guiding behaviors through the reception of new information, resulting in social changes and transformations.