During Maia's third term, management of the city's public hospitals was deemed as so poor that in March 2005 the federal Ministry of Health decreed an intervention in health facilities jointly administered by the federal government and the city, two military field hospitals being set in order to deal with the ongoing jam. taking 54 lives at the three first months of the year, despite Maia's declaring it to be a purely local occurrence In late March 2008, Maia traveled to Salvador and declared that he had "prayed to the Senhor do Bonfim to blow away the Rio mosquitos to the sea" and that he had travelled to Bahia "in order to bring Rio the strong spiritual vibes we have here".