# Drauzio Varella

Antônio Drauzio Varella (Portuguese:; born May 3, 1943, in São Paulo, Brazil) is a Brazilian physician, educator, scientist and medical science popularizer in the press and TV, as well as best-selling author. In addition to medicine, Varella is a public commentator on issues such as prison conditions, social welfare, government, literature and his professed atheism and skepticism, and has frequently debunked pseudoscientific medical claims.
Varella was born in the Brás district of São Paulo to family of Portuguese and Spanish descent and studied medicine at the University of São Paulo. While a student, he was among the founders of preparatory course Sistema Objetivo, where he taught chemistry for several years. The institution was later expanded into Universidade Paulista Varella received the 2000 Prêmio Jabuti for his book Estação Carandiru.

## Career

After his 1967 graduation, he specialized in infectious diseases with Prof. Vicente Amato Neto, at the University of São Paulo and at the Hospital do Servidor Público de São Paulo. This work led him to develop an interest in immunology. Varella interned at MD Anderson in 1978, and has worked at Hospital do Câncer, specializing in oncology.
As a medical professor, he works at Universidade Paulista, but has taught also in several other institutions in Brazil and abroad, such as the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Cleveland Clinic, Karolinska Institute, Hiroshima University and the National Cancer Center of Japan. Varella has often studied AIDS, specifically the treatment of Kaposi's sarcoma.
He has had an active role in prevention and educational campaigns about AIDS, being the first one to have a radio program on the subject. From 1989 to 2001 he volunteered to work as an unpaid physician in one of the largest prisons of Brazil, the Carandiru, in order to help tackle an AIDS epidemic among inmates. He wrote the best-seller book Estação Carandiru chronicling this experience, later adapted in the film Carandiru, by Hector Babenco). The book has been described as a quasi-ethnographical study of the prison.
As the chairman of a cancer research institute at Universidade Paulista, Varella presently heads a research program on the potential of Brazilian Amazon medicinal plants for treating neoplasms and antibiotic-resistant bacteria. This research is supported by the São Paulo Research Support Foundation.

## Writing

Varella is also very active in the public understanding of science, particularly in the medical area. He writes columns for the largest Brazilian newspapers and was invited by the Globo TV Network to host a series of programs on the human body, the brain, first aid, smoking,pregnancy, obesity and others, which were exhibited at the Fantástico show on Sundays. He is also the producer and host of a TV talk show on medicine and health, which is broadcast on several TV channels.
For his work as a writer, Varella received several prizes and awards, among them the Prêmio Jabuti from the Brazilian Book Chamber, the International Book Fair of Bologna, Bologna, Italy, and The International Book Biennal of Rio de Janeiro (2001).
He has also written fiction for adults and children and has often been a vocal supporter of scientific skepticism.

## Controversy

In 2020, Varella was criticized after hugging an inmate who been convicted of murdering and raping a 9-year-old child during a documentary aired on Fantástico reporting on the life of trans women incarcerated in male prisons. He later apologized, stating that he did not know what crime she had committed, and that he avoids learning this information to avoid bias when treating patients.

## Personal life

Varella has been married to actress Regina Braga since 1981, and has fathered two daughters. He is an atheist.

## Works

* Carcereiros (2012)
* Prisioneiras
* AIDS Hoje. In 3 volumes, in collaboration with Antonio Fernando Varella and Narciso Escaleira.
* Estação Carandiru (1999), Companhia das Letras.
* Macacos, Publifolha ("Folha Explica" series)
* Nas ruas do Brás. Companhia das Letrinhas (children's book)
* De braços para o alto. Companhia das Letrinhas (children's book)
* Florestas do Rio Negro. With Alexandre Adalardo de Oliveira and Douglas C. Daly
* Maré - Vida na Favela
* Casa das Palavras, with Paola Berenstein, Ivaldo Bertazzo and Pedro Seiblitz (images).
* Por um fio. Companhia das Letras, 2004.