In brief

22 Feb 2010

Paul Chinnock

Source: Media reports

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Reports continue of successes achieved against dracunculiasis (guinea worm disease). Ghana’s Upper West Region is now claimed to be free of the disease; a Ghana News Agency report says the last instance of it was a single imported case in 2008. UNICEF believes that Niger is poised to eradicate the disease; there were no local cases in 2009 though five imported cases were recorded – see Afrique en ligne report. Progress in Niger is remarkable considering that in 1991 there were an estimated 33,000 cases in the worst affected parts of the country. Most of the world’s remaining cases (80%) are believed to be in southern Sudan, where 2,753 people with dracunculiasis were reported last year but this still represents a huge reduction from the figure of 20,000 for 2006. According to IRIN News, the government of Sudan hopes to eradicate the disease within two or three years.

Leprosy has been officially eliminated as a public health problem in Nepal but an IRIN News report reminds us that elimination is defined as being achieved when fewer than one in 10,000 people have the disease. Much remains to be done before there is total eradication. Whilst prevalence is 0.89 cases per 10,000 nationally, in some districts two or three people per 10,000 have the disease. There are also many thousands of people who have been cured of their leprosy but have been left with disabilities and must live with the problem of stigma towards their condition. There are concerns that last month’s declaration that the elimination target had been reached nationally, could result in complacency and a weakening of efforts to fight the disease.

The government of Kenya has failed in its appeal to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which last year rejected its application for funding worth $270 million to support programmes aimed at tackling the three diseases. The Daily Nation newspaper describes the failure of the appeal as “a big blow to the fight against HIV, TB and malaria”. The Global Fund considers that Kenya’s performance in the use of funds it has provided previously has been disappointing. The appeals panel says the latest application for funding contained major weakness, including a lack of clarity and an explanation as to how the government planned to address past accounting problems. Kenya’s HIV/AIDS efforts are likely to most feel the affect of the failure of the appeal, but TB and malaria activities will also suffer. Medical Services Minister Professor Anyang’ Nyong’o is reported to have said that he is “tired by constant threats to block funding”.

The Roll Back Malaria Partnership (RBM) will receive $25 million of new funding over the next five years from the government of Abu Dhabi. “This funding will have a direct impact upon the capacity of the Partnership to accelerate current advances and ensure that countries move closer to the RBM universal coverage targets and the malaria-related UN Millennium Development Goals,” said RBM Executive Director Prof Awa Marie Coll-Seck.

Increased resistance to malarial drugs is often blamed on the growing numbers of fake and substandard drugs in circulation. However, Ugandan researchers believe that a more important factor is the improper use of medications, which they say stems primarily from “cultural beliefs and ignorance”. Dr Myers Lugemwa, the officer in charge of malaria research at the Ministry of Health told the East African newspaper that this was his view, in response to the publication of a report on the high prevalence of fake antimalarials in Africa (see TropIKA.net News).

India’s Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) is said to be making encouraging progress. However, an article in The Hindu says that most of the country’s private doctors are not yet collaborating with the programme, which seeks to expand the use of WHO’s recommended DOTS strategy for TB treatment. Some 20,000 private doctors treat patients using DOTS but Dr L S Chauhan, Deputy Director General of the Central Tuberculosis Division, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, wants this figure to rise to three or four hundred thousand.