摘要：Visceral Leishmaniasis (VL) is a typical tropical zoonosis, transmitted by the female insect of the genus Lutzomyia longipalpis. Brazil is one of the countries that have suffered with this disease, given the great changes in the natural environment of the mosquito, due to the growth of cities and exacerbated deforestation of riparian forest. In the country, the State of Minas Gerais is the third in numbers of cases of LV, where the North Mesorregion shows the great number of incidences. Therefore, the objective of this study was to evaluate the influence of LV´s socio-economic indicators in this region. It created and discriminated municipalities´ groups according to the incidence of this zoonosis in the period 1998 to 2008 using the multivariate statistics. It was noticed that LV was not reduced over the years; on the contrary it increased. The Municipality of Matias Cardoso had the largest increase in this period (550%). Regarding the discrimination of the groups, there was the strong influence of urbanization and the importance of sanitation in combating the vector. The education and the public policies aimed at awareness of the population is also necessary to have adequate control of the disease
