In the facilities of the Cartagena del Mar Clinic in the city of Cartagena, the first Public Health Fair was held, organized by the Area of Preventive and Community Medicine of our University, which was aimed at students, teachers and healthcare staff of the entity, who were able to socialize technical guidelines established by the Ministry of Health and Social Protection and the National Institute of Health in relation to vector-borne diseases.

With this fair, we sought to create a space where experiences could be shared among health professionals, seeking to generate a dynamic of academic discussion that allows promoting research development in the field of public health.

The topics exposed during the day were led by the students of the Environment and Health Course of the First Semester of the School of Medicine, who touched on topics such as Dengue, Malaria, Chikungunya, Visceral Leishmaniasis, Mayaro, Zika, among others, emphasizing mainly the environmental risk factors associated with the presence of vectors that transmit these pathologies; signs, symptoms, diagnostic methods of these diseases and the report to the Public Health Surveillance System-SIVIGILA. 

Sebastián Puertas, a participant in this activity added: “This was an activity that was born thanks to the need for reports on these diseases, which are currently having a great impact in our country. The people at the clinic showed great interest, since they were able to clear up doubts about certain points that were unknown and wanted to learn even more.”