This article is part of a series on Beyond English: Accessing the global epidemiological literature, edited by Mr. Isaac Fung, Imperial College London.

Analytic perspective

Public health and epidemiology journals published in Brazil and other Portuguese speaking countries

Mauricio L Barreto¹ and Rita Barradas Barata²

¹  Instituto de Saúde Coletiva, Federal University of Bahia, Salvador, Brazil

²  Department of Social Medicine, School of Medical Sciences of Santa Casa de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil

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Emerging Themes in Epidemiology 2008, 5:18doi:10.1186/1742-7622-5-18

Published:	30 September 2008

Abstract

It is well known that papers written in languages other than English have a great risk of being ignored simply because these languages are not accessible to the international scientific community. The objective of this paper is to facilitate the access to the public health and epidemiology literature available in Portuguese speaking countries. It was found that it is particularly concentrated in Brazil, with some few examples in Portugal and none in other Portuguese speaking countries. This literature is predominantly written in Portuguese, but also in other languages such as English or Spanish. The paper describes the several journals, as well as the bibliographic databases that index these journals and how to access them. Most journals provide open-access with direct links in the indexing databases. The importance of this scientific production for the development of epidemiology as a scientific discipline and as a basic discipline for public health practice is discussed. To marginalize these publications has implications for a more balanced knowledge and understanding of the health problems and their determinants at a world-wide level.