Overview
This research, conducted in partnership with the Wellcome Trust, the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation was a two-site study in Brazil, focussing on Recife, where Zika virus (ZIKV) is highly endemic, and Rio de Janeiro, where it had been less common until recently.
A mixed methods study, the project aimed to assess the social and economic impacts of ZIKV at the individual (mother), family and societal level, by collecting quantitative, economic and qualitative data. The focus of the research was on Congenital Zika Syndrome (CZS). Outputs included scientific papers on the social and economic impacts of ZIKV at the individual and societal level and a stakeholder workshop.
The VCP team was responsible for leading the qualitative component of this project, which aimed to understand the social and economic impacts of ZIKV among women, taking into consideration the social determinants of health and illness and the part they played in this epidemic.
The research also aimed to understand how risk perception, risk communication and anxieties fuelled by uncertainties are impacting women’s actions and interactions with health and social services. The research examines what narratives about present and future are being formed; what coping strategies are in place (individual and community); what sort of support (social, governmental, financial) is available to families and babies with CZS and what additional support families with babies with CZS feel would help them. The research will also explore where women, their families and health care workers at different levels of the system get their information about ZIKV and CZS and which sources of information that they trust.
