While the causative agent of the Covid-19 pandemic is currently spreading like never before, the trigger of another disease is on the verge of extinction: Just 14 cases of infection with the Guinea worm were reported in 2021.
This is the lowest number ever recorded. In the 1980s, the parasite, which causes painful skin lesions, appeared in more than 20 countries and at that time refused 3.5 million people annually.
"It's pretty amazing," says Adam Weiss, who directs the Guinea worm eradication program at the Carter Center, based in Atlanta, Georgia. His organization announced the latest infection figures for 2021 at the end of January. "14 people on a planet with almost eight billion people. The thought of it is overwhelming."
Compared to 2020, the number of infected has fallen again by almost half. This is the result of almost 40 years of efforts by international organizations and national governments, says Weiss. If we succeed in ridding the world of Guinea worm, it would be the third disease after smallpox and rinderpest to be deliberately eradicated in human history.
Julie Swann, who researches the North Carolina State University in Raleigh for modeling Seuchen, also gives progress remarkable. Especially if you consider that there is no recognized treatment or a vaccine for the parasite. Instead, the exterior campaigns had concentrated on preventing the transmission.
Whether the worm will be completely eradicated in the foreseeable future, however, is questionable. Because it still multiplies in domestic and wild animals, and that makes its control and control difficult, experts explain.
In addition to humans, the guinea worm also infects some animals, including cats, dogs and baboons, when they drink water contaminated with larvae of the worm. After growing inside the body for a year, the parasite penetrates outside through the skin of its host, waiting to come into contact with water to release larvae. The outbreak of the worm is painful and can last up to six weeks, so sometimes people can not work or even walk anymore.
Since Guinea worm disease is easily recognizable, the parasite is also easy to detect. In Chad, where half of the 14 cases were reported in 2021, workers on the ground have set up a network to track down contaminated water sources, says Philippe Tchindebet Ouakou, the coordinator of the national Guinea worm eradication program based in N'Djamena. They then prevent people from drinking the contaminated water and use pesticides to disinfect it.
Similar approaches were used in countries such as South Sudan, Mali and Ethiopia, where the other seven cases discovered in 2021 occurred. These methods kept the number of cases low, says Ouakou, and could also be used to combat other endemic diseases.
However, Swann is not entirely convinced that eradication is possible: it is fundamentally difficult to fight diseases that have an animal reservoir. In Chad alone, 790 cases of Guinea worm infections in dogs were reported in 2021.
But the well -known infections in the animal kingdom decreased by 45 percent by 2021, says Weiss. He remains optimistic that an extermination is within reach. The programs to exterminate the parasite also include the pets of the population. Paviane is likely to infect water that was contaminated by dogs with the guinosaw. Weiss therefore advertises to put infected dogs on a leash in order to curb the spread of the pathogen in the wildlife.
"I firmly believe that the Guinea worm can be eradicated," he says. "It will take us some effort, but if I thought it was hopeless, I would be the first to admit it."
The International Task Force for Disease Eradication has currently classified eight diseases as potentially out of date. In addition to the guinos!
