Reuters: Health workers say close to eradicating Guinea worm
ATLANTA (Reuters) – Health workers are on the verge of eradicating Guinea worm disease in what would be just the second time in history a disease has been wiped from the planet, the Carter Center said on Friday.
Cheap interventions such as hygiene education, using larvicides to kill the worm and distributing inexpensive cloths to help filter parasites from drinking water have cut the infection rate by 99 percent, reported the center founded by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter.
Fewer than 5,000 cases of Guinea worm disease, also known as dracunculiasis, remain in Mali, Niger, Ghana, Nigeria, Sudan and Ethiopia, the center said.
There were around 3.5 million cases in 1986 when the global effort to get rid of the disease, led by the Carter Center, began. Last year the number had dropped to 9,600. …
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