Prevalence and predictors of breastfeeding in the MINA-Brazil cohort.
Mosquera PS, Lourenço BH, Matijasevich A, Castro MC, Cardoso MA.
Rev Saude Publica. 2024. 57Suppl 2(Suppl 2):2s. PMID: 38422331
Chair, Department of Global Health and Population
Global Health and Population
Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Marcia Castro is Andelot Professor of Demography, chair of the Department of Global Health and Population, director of the Brazil Studies Program of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS) at Harvard University, associate faculty of the Harvard University Center for the Environment, and faculty member of the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies.
Her research focuses on the development and use of multidisciplinary approaches to identify the determinants of infectious disease transmission in different ecological settings to inform control policies. She has more than 20 years of research experience in the Brazilian Amazon, with a strong record in conducting household surveys and thorough knowledge of the local culture. Furthermore, she has more than 15 years of collaboration with Brazilian researchers, health secretariats, and the ministry of health, particularly related to infectious diseases.
Currently, Castro has projects on malaria, COVID-19, arboviruses, infant/child mortality and development, and climate change in the Brazilian Amazon. Specifically, she has been assessing the spatiotemporal pattern of COVID-19 spread in Brazil, mortality and fertility changes due to the pandemic, risk factors for mortality, and vaccine effectiveness.
During recent public health emergencies, such as the Zika virus epidemic and the COVID-19 pandemic, Castro made important contributions. At the World Health Organization, she served as co-chair of the Technical Consultation on The Burden of and Response to Malaria in Urban Areas in 2021 and as an advisor of the Evidence Review Group on border malaria in 2017.
She serves on several advisory boards in Brazil, including the Institute for the Studies of Health Policies (IEPS), the Science Center for Early Childhood (NCPI), Instituto Todos Pela Saúde (ITpS), and Instituto Cactus. She is a columnist for Folha de São Paulo and an elected member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
BS, 1986, Statistics
Rio de Janeiro State University (UERJ), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
MA, 1997, Demography
CEDEPLAR, Minas Gerais Federal University, Belo Horizonte, Brazil
PhD, 2002, Demography
Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey
Mosquera PS, Lourenço BH, Matijasevich A, Castro MC, Cardoso MA.
Rev Saude Publica. 2024. 57Suppl 2(Suppl 2):2s. PMID: 38422331
Lourenço BH, Rodrigues CZ, Damasceno AAA, Cardoso MA, Castro MC.
Rev Saude Publica. 2024. 57Suppl 2(Suppl 2):3s. PMID: 38422332
Matijasevich A, Faisal-Cury A, Giacomini I, Rodrigues JS, Castro MC, Cardoso MA.
Rev Saude Publica. 2024. 57Suppl 2(Suppl 2):5s. PMID: 38422334
Cardoso MA, Lourenço BH, Matijasevich A, Castro MC, Ferreira MU.
Rev Saude Publica. 2024. 57Suppl 2(Suppl 2):6s. PMID: 38422335
Fontoura PS, Macedo EG, Calil PR, Corder RM, Rodrigues PT, Tonini J, Esquivel FD, Ladeia WA, Fernandes ARJ, Johansen IC, Silva MF, Fernandes AOS, Ladeia-Andrade S, Castro MC, Ferreira MU.
J Infect Dis. 2024 Feb 07. PMID: 38324758
Etti M, Neto ASL, Monteiro HS, Araújo MAL, Dos Santos de Sousa G, Castro MC.
PLOS Glob Public Health. 2023. 3(12):e0002626. PMID: 38055689
Scott VK, Pinheiro MSN, Machado MMT, Castro MC.
BMC Public Health. 2023 12 04. 23(1):2408. PMID: 38049772
Altafim ERP, Castro MC, Rocha HAL, Correia LL, de Aquino CM, Sampaio EGM, Machado MMT.
Matern Child Health J. 2023 Nov 08. PMID: 37938442
Lourenço BH, Neves PA, Cardoso MA, Castro MC.
J Glob Health. 2023 Sep 11. 13:04070. PMID: 37694574
Monteiro HS, Lima Neto AS, Kahn R, Sousa GS, Carmona HA, Andrade JS, Castro MC.
Vaccine. 2023 09 07. 41(39):5742-5751. PMID: 37573202
Since the start of her career, Marcia Castro has sought to use her research to inform policy change.
To fill gaps in the Brazilian government’s COVID-19 response, the organization G10 Favelas implemented emergency actions to support residents, including mobilizing a cadre of volunteer “street presidents” to provide health and nutrition assistance.
A diverse group of 42 leaders from across Brazil came together at Harvard this summer to learn about the latest science in early childhood development and to create plans for interventions they can implement locally.
The wide-ranging health impacts of climate change, including food insecurity, migration, war, and the spread of infectious diseases—and practical solutions to address these problems—were the focus of a half-day symposium hosted by Harvard Chan School.
For three weeks in January, 18 students from Harvard traveled to Brazil to join 18 local students for a collaborative public health field course.