[Community participation in Dengue prevention: an approach from the perspective of different social actors].
OBJECTIVE
To explore the perceptions about community participation in dengue fever control during formative research for a community project.


METHODS
This study was conducted in three health areas of the Santiago de Cuba municipality during the year 2000. Qualitative and quantitative techniques were used to explore the opinions of health professionals, community leaders and a random sample of 200 people living in the community.


RESULTS
The health professionals who were interviewed judged that difficulties in Aedes aegypti control were due to lack of participation of the community and to limited knowledge of prevention methods. Community leaders considered that the population was poorly motivated. The randomly selected subjects who were interviewed did associate Aedes control with technological intervention. The authors identified barriers to acceptance of control program activities. In general, the concept of "participation" was interpreted as "collaboration".


CONCLUSIONS
Our findings show that the community has transferred the responsibility for Aedes aegypti control to the health sector. There is an evident need for unifying the concepts of community participation, as well as for matching the interests of users and health care providers, in order to attain a significant social mobilization.
Departamento de epidemiología, Instituto de Medicina Tropical Pedro Kouri, Habana, Cuba. mariaeugenia@ipk.sid.cu
María Eugenia
ME
Toledo-Romani
Alberto
A
Baly-Gil
Enrique
E
Ceballos-Ursula
Marleen
M
Boelaert
Patrick
P
Van der Stuyft
D003256:Community Participation; D003462:Cuba; D003715:Dengue / Q000517:prevention & control*; D006801:Humans; D012961:Sociology