Scientific Education and Research Centre of the National Institute for Cancer Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: Fid-Bau Portal

Scientific Education and Research Centre of the National Institute for Cancer Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

De Oliveira, Benedito Tadeu

The article seeks to analyze the importance of the former headquarters of the Board of Public Health – DGSP (Diretoria Geral de Saúde Pública), in implementing and institutionalizing Brazilian public health policies, and the importance for Brazil of its restoration and reuse as the Centro de Difusão Científica [Scientific Education and Research Centre]. Constructed (1905-1914) at the initiative of Oswaldo Cruz and designed by the Portuguese architect Luiz Moraes Júnior, the following aspects of the old headquarters of the DGSP are examined: the original site; economic and technical means used in construction; the reasoning, programmes and purpose behind its use; economic, physical and conceptual limits and conditions of space; the creators, their ideas and programmes; the architects, their training, works and methods; the buildings and their environmental surroundings throughout the 20th century; with the City of Rio de Janeiro. The article also analyses the various proposed interventions: structural reinforcement, modernization of the installations, recovery of the construction materials and systems, as well as historic and architectural values; the original forms, volumes and spaces of the buildings. The current initiative taken by the Instituto Nacional do Câncer - Inca- of the Health Ministry, current owner of the property, recovers and preserves a reference point for the origin, evolution and institutionalization of Brazilian public health policies. A modern scientific education and research centre for researchers, health professionals, doctors and residents, as well as the general public, is to be installed in the buildings.