Abstract

GARCIA, Susana Isabel. Surveillance of poisoning in Argentina and Latin America. Reporting, analysis and event management. Acta toxicol. argent. [online]. 2016, vol.24, n.2, pp.134-160. ISSN 1851-3743.

Surveillance of poisoning, or toxicovigilance, is a fundamental tool for the assessment of health risks and the assessment of the effects of regulatory measures that make the safety of chemicals. There are many Latin American experiences from the National Epidemiological Surveillance where many poisonings have been included in the lists of notifiable diseases such as pesticide poisoning, metals and oil, botulism poisonings venomous animals, poisoning drug or drugs of abuse. In this field also differences are observed in national and regional listings, highlighting, for example, notification of poisoning by adulterated alcohol with methanol or glyphosate in Colombia, paralytic shellfish poisoning in Southern Cone countries, pesticide poisoning in Central America and its relationship to chronic kidney disease. There are also peculiarities in the definitions of outbreak and epidemiological alerts, as well as the urgency or frequency required for notification. Information Centers and Toxicological Consulting and Clinical Toxicology Laboratories Analysis also play an important role in this regard, the most specialized effectors in the diagnosis and where you can get better information. Important has been the implementation of international conventions toxicovigilance Chemical Safety such as Rotterdam and Stockholm, and efforts by the United Nations to harmonize national records and reports.

Keywords : Toxicovigilance; Argentina; Latin America; Epidemiology.