Dr. Alexandre Amato
Born in April 1865 in Campanha, Minas Gerais, Vital Brasil Mineiro da Campanha worked hard to be able to study medicine, graduating in 1891 from the Faculty of Medicine of Rio de Janeiro.
He devoted himself to science with such zeal that he even contracted bubonic plague and yellow fever in the course of his work.
Upon graduating, he left for France, where he specialized in Paris in laboratory studies under professors Mesnil, Metchnikoff, Borel and Roux.
On returning to Brazil, he was appalled by the number of lives lost to snakebites and began to study the subject, dedicating all his energies to it. In 1898, at the Bacteriological Institute of São Paulo, he prepared the first effective antivenoms against the venoms of Crotalus and Bothrops snakes. The following year, Adolpho Lutz suggested to the government the creation of a serum-therapy institute, which became the Butantan Institute, formally established in 1901 and directed by Vital Brasil.
In 1919, he moved to Niterói, where he founded the Institute of Hygiene, Serum Therapy and Veterinary Medicine, today the Vital Brasil Institute.
Of his six children, all devoted themselves to medicine and research. One of them, following his father’s example, died of an infection contracted while carrying out research on streptococci.
Several of his works stand out, such as O ofidismo no Brasil (1906) and A defesa contra o ofidismo (1911).
He died in May 1950, at the age of 85, as one of the greatest Brazilian scientists. And, on becoming immortal, his name was “Brazilianized”: from Dr. Vital Brazil, he came to be called Dr. Vital Brasil.
