Not many people know about neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) – a group of parasitic infections that cause needless suffering among more than 1 billion of the poorest people worldwide. END7 is a campaign to see the end of 7 of the most common NTDs by 2020. All it costs is 50¢ to treat and protect one person for one year.
Join us in our mission to end 7 diseases by 2020 – watch our mission in (just over) a minute below and . Together we can see the end!
Emily Cotter was a Student Ambassador for the Global Network in 2009. She has blogged for us in the past, and today she reflects on her experience advocating for NTDs.
In November 2009, the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases launched their inaugural Campus Challenge, a contest challenging students to become leaders in the fight to prevent, control and eliminate the world’s most common NTDs. I had just returned from Sierra Leone a few months prior, having worked with Helen Keller International (HKI) on their NTD surveillance and control programs. Inspired by the work I had done with HKI, I became a Student Ambassador for the Global Network in order to indulge my passion for advocacy and treatment of NTDs by recruiting other interested students at the George Washington University School of Medicine and leading one of these Campus Challenge efforts.
I knew that many of my fellow medical students were similarly interested in NTDs after recently learning about them from Dr. Peter Hotez during our Microbiology course. A small group of us initially met to brainstorm ideas for the Campus Challenge – activities such as bake-sales, “wormy-grams” for Valentine’s Day, fundraising happy hours, and announcements and coin collections during classes. We also organized alunchtime lecture given by Dr. Peter Hotez; this event educated the greater GW community about NTDs, the Campus Challenge, and ways to get involved with the campaign. At each of our events we mobilized a grassroots NTD army by advertising ways for interested students to get involved and join our campaign at GW. In the end, I had more than 20 students on my email list for the campus challenge!
March 8 is International Women’s Day, a day to acknowledge and celebrate the political, economic, and social advancements of women. This year’s theme is “Equal access to education, training and science and technology: Pathway to decent work for women.” Being infected with a neglected tropical disease (NTD) can impede both the educational and professional development for both women and girls. Debilitating infections such as the seven most common NTDs can caused missed school days for young girls, delaying their education and stunting their potential for advancement. For women, socially stigmatizing NTDs such as lymphatic filariasis (LF), onchocerciasis, and leishmaniasis effects their productivity among other aspects of their life, and perpetuates the cycle of poverty.
On this International Women’s Day, help provide treatment for women infected with NTDs for just 50 cents. See how you can get involved in the fight against NTDs on our website.
ND Fighting NTDs is a student-run group from the University of Notre Dame. They have contributed to End the Neglect in the past, most recently with this blog post highlighting their Annual NTD Awareness week at Notre Dame last December. Today we are featuring a video that they created as an advocacy tool to encourage others to “do their part” in the fight against NTDs.
**Warning: Graphic content:
