Oswaldo Cruz Foundation

Hello! We are the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, a scientific institution in Brazil dedicated to protecting and improving public health. Many people know us by our nickname, Fiocruz. Our story is a long one, and it began with a mission to help people stay healthy and safe from dangerous diseases.

Our journey started in the city of Rio de Janeiro on May 25th, 1900. A brilliant Brazilian scientist named Oswaldo Cruz founded our institution to solve a very serious problem. At the time, a dangerous illness called the bubonic plague was spreading. Our very first task was to create the tools to fight it. We set up laboratories and began to make serums and vaccines. Serums could help treat people who were already sick, while vaccines could prevent healthy people from getting the disease in the first place. This important work was the foundation of everything we would do in the years to come.

Soon after we began, Oswaldo Cruz led us in major public health campaigns to fight other serious diseases that were affecting Rio de Janeiro. Two of the biggest threats were yellow fever and smallpox. To stop yellow fever, we had to understand how it spread. We learned that it was carried by mosquitos, so we organized large clean-up efforts throughout the city to remove the standing water where these insects laid their eggs. At the same time, we worked to vaccinate as many people as possible against smallpox, an illness that had no cure but could be prevented. These campaigns showed that taking action across a whole city could save thousands of lives.

As time passed, we realized that simply responding to outbreaks wasn't enough. To truly protect people's health, we needed to understand diseases on a deeper level. Our mission grew and expanded. We began to focus more on scientific research, studying how different illnesses worked, what caused them, and the best ways to stop them. We became not just fighters of disease, but students of it. We sent our scientific teams on expeditions all over the vast country of Brazil. These trips were important because they helped us learn about the unique health challenges faced by people living in different regions, far from the big cities. This research helped us develop ways to fight illnesses like Chagas disease, which affected many rural communities.

Today, we have grown into one of the most important public health institutions in the world. Our work now includes many different areas. We have advanced laboratories where our scientists conduct research to invent new medicines and improve vaccines. We are a major producer of vaccines for Brazil's national health system, helping to protect millions of children and adults from many different diseases. We also run our own hospitals, where we care for patients with complex health problems. And, to ensure this important work continues, we have schools where we teach and train the next generation of scientists, doctors, and public health experts.

Our long history of protecting Brazilians prepared us for modern challenges. When the COVID-19 pandemic began, we knew we had a critical role to play. We used our expertise and our facilities to produce millions of vaccines for the people of Brazil. This massive effort was a direct continuation of the mission we started over a century ago with Oswaldo Cruz. From fighting the bubonic plague in 1900 to confronting a global pandemic today, our purpose remains the same: to use science to promote health and save lives for everyone.