WHO UNVEILS NEW APPROACH TO NEGLECTED TROPICAL DISEASES

The World Health Organization (WHO) and a group of more than 25 partner organizations have unveiled a new strategy to fight neglected tropical diseases in Africa and elsewhere.

The approach contained in a newly published manual, Preventive Chemotherapy in Human Helminthiasis, focuses on how and when a set of low-cost or free drugs should be used in developing African countries to control a set of diseases caused by worm infections. Preventive chemotherapy in this context means using drugs that are effective against a broad range of worm infections to simultaneously treat the four most common diseases caused by worms: river blindness (onchocerciasis), elephantiasis (lymphatic filariasis), schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminthiasis. Significant opportunities also exist to integrate these efforts with the prevention and control of diseases such as trachoma.

"In the same way as we protect people against a number of vaccine-preventable diseases throughout their lives, the regular and coordinated use of a few drugs can protect people against worm-induced disease," Lorenzo Savioli, director of the WHO Department for the Control of Neglected Tropical Diseases, said.

The second key component of the strategy brings together for the first time dozens of agencies, nongovernment organizations, pharmaceutical companies and others into a coordinated attack on neglected diseases. These groups are integrating their expertise and resources to deliver the manual's protocols for wide-scale drug use. A wealth of experience and success already exists in the public health community in dealing with these diseases. The effects of these diseases can now be dramatically reduced by scaling up interventions using highly effective drugs of proven quality and excellent safety record -- the majority donated free by companies or costing less than $0.40 per person per year, including the cost of the drugs and their delivery, according to the WHO.