Monthly Archives: August 2013

NTD Treatment to Reach Millions in a Country Cloaked in Mystery

Asia, END7, NTDs, ,

 

In two weeks, a school-age child somewhere in the mountainous region of Thaton, Myanmar will hold out their hand and receive a tiny white pill. They’ll take a gulp from a cup of water, swallow it, and then move on with their day.

It’s a simple transaction that lasts five seconds, but this routine provision of medicine has big implications for the health and development of Myanmar.

Neglected tropical diseases like hookworm and elephantiasis currently pose a risk to more than 80 percent of the population of Myanmar.   Common among people living in poverty, these diseases often cause or worsen health conditions like anemia and malnutrition, which affect large portions of the population in Myanmar.  The country is one of the poorest among its neighbors in the South/Southeast Asia region.

That’s why last year we supported the training of hundreds of community health workers who helped to deliver donated medicine to millions of people in schools and homes around the country.

This September, we’re doing it again. With support from END7 as well as other development partners like the World Health Organization and pharmaceutical companies like GlaxoSmithKline, the government of Myanmar is leading a mass drug administration campaign that will reach an estimated 22 million people with treatment.

Despite many challenges, Myanmar is making substantial progress in controlling and eliminating NTDs.  Lack of available resources to implement the program is the primary challenge now, and .

Burmese Nobel Laurete and chairperson of the National League for Democracy in Myanmar Aung San Suu Kyi once noted, “We will surely get to our destination if we join hands.”  We know that there’s a brighter future for children in Myanmar if they’re free from NTDs.

Will you ?  Or, will you  with your friends instead? 

Now is the Time to Coordinate Efforts between Malaria and Lymphatic Filariasis Control

malaria, NTDs,

 

bed_net

Image: Flickr user 4Cheungs/CC

By: Greg Simon

A new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine further strengthens the evidence that sleeping under insecticide treated bed-nets (ITNs) helps to eliminate Lymphatic filariasis (elephantiasis or LF) and malaria.

Lymphatic filariasis (elephantiasis or LF) is a parasitic-worm infection that affects approximately 120 million people worldwide. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 120 million people suffer from LF — one-third of which have been disfigured or debilitated by the disease. The WHO has a goal of eliminating LF as a public health problem by the year 2020. With approximately 1.4 billion people living in endemic areas, the task is an enormous one which will require multiple interventions. Global efforts to eliminate LF have been based on the annual mass drug administration (MDA) of anti-filarial drugs to reduce the microfilaria reservoir available to the mosquito vector. While the stand alone MDA approach can work in areas where the infection rate is low, areas with high infection rates may need to incorporate other measures to reduce the incidence of LF.

The New England Journal of Medicine study titled: “Insecticidal Bed Nets and Filariasis Transmission in Papua New Guinea,” studied five villages in which five annual MDAs were performed in cooperation with ITN distribution. According to the research, the ITNs block female mosquitoes from securing blood, which is essential for them to produce offspring; the insecticide also cuts in half the insect’s life span, preventing the parasite from being transmitted.

The study noted the rates of bites from mosquitoes were reduced 6.4 to 61.3 bites per person per day before the bed-net distribution to 1.1 to 9.4 bites for 11 months after distribution. During the same period, the rate of detection of parasite in mosquitoes decreased 78%, and the rate of detection of filarial DNA decreased 23%.  The study found the annual transmission potential was 5 to 325 infective larvae inoculated per person per year before the ITN distribution and 0 after the distribution. It noted that among all five villages with a prevalence of parasite of 2 to 38 percent, the probability of transmission cessation increased from less than 1.0 percent before the bed-net distribution to a range of 4.9 to 95 percent in the 11 months after distribution.

While this study demonstrates the power of combined interventions to prevent both LF and malaria, it is not the first. Another successful program was a five-year malaria treatment program in Togo initiated in 2005 and funded by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. In addition to providing artesunate plus lumefantrine for treatment of malaria, this program also provided ivermectin and albendazole treatment via MDA to populations at risk for LF and malaria.

The current international financial crisis has caused many donors to concentrate on funding programs that can demonstrate high cost-effectiveness. Many organizations have found it necessary to integrate multiple programs in order to increase efficiencies and reduce costs. Hence, incorporation of simple, inexpensive interventions that causes little interference to the main program(s). This study provides excellent examples of ways to combat two different diseases that use the same mechanisms of infection and that affect millions of people world-wide. Linking these disease controls can also promote effective partnerships with national strategic plans and country ownership; investment in human capital; introduction of innovative financing strategies and improvement in health service delivery models.

We Need Your Voice: Now’s the Time to Tell World Leaders to End NTDs

Global Development, policy, post 2015, , , ,

 

700x700UN_Secretary-General_END7As September quickly approaches, world leaders are gearing up for the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) where they’ll discuss how to improve the lives of the billion people on the planet living in extreme poverty. These poor and neglected populations represent those suffering from devastating and disfiguring neglected tropical diseases (NTDs).

We know that treating NTDs is a catalyst for achieving broader development goals, especially those outlined in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). This is why I’ve written a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urging him to prioritize NTDs as part of his strategy to reduce poverty and inequality worldwide.

This is where you come in: By adding your name to my letter, our message will be amplified. Will you send a message to Ban Ki-moon now on behalf of the billion people suffering from NTDs? 

NTDs perpetuate a cycle of poverty that continues from generation to generation. These diseases directly affect nutrition, school attendance and the development of children. Even more, they undercut economic growth and increase the likelihood of contracting other harmful diseases like HIV.

But if we act now, we can persuade the world’s governments to help the world’s most neglected people by resolving to eliminate NTDs once and for all.

Ban Ki-moon has said “eradicating extreme poverty continues to be one of the main challenges of our time.” However, we know that poverty cannot be solved as long as one in six people are living with NTDs.

But there is good news: The medicine to treat NTDs is cheap, safe, available and life-changing. Even more, global momentum is growing to treat and prevent NTDs. The recent report issues by the High Level Panel of Eminent Persons on the Post-2015 Development Agenda placed NTDs alongside the most pressing global health issues, such as preventing maternal and child deaths; HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis.

Together we can elevate funding, research and political will for NTD treatment. Will you be a part of this success story?

Add your name here and pass it on. Together we can see the end of 7 NTDs.