In 1980, the World Health Organization officially declared that one of the deadliest diseases in human history, smallpox has been eradicated. It was the first action of its kind following which the disease was completely eliminated on the planet. Achieving this goal was not exactly easy. It took a collaborative effort, which meant especially vaccination campaigns worldwide surveillance and prevention measures.
Now humanity is closer to eradicating other diseases that might not have heard of Guinea worm disease.
Even if it is rarely fatal, which is why I was not given the necessary attention, guinea worm disease or Dracunculoză can be permanently removed.
People acquire the infection when drinking water contaminated with larvae of the worm dracunculus medinensis, called "worm Guinea." The larvae then penetrate the gut wall and grow within the human body since about a year, reaching a length of 80 inches .
The worm migrates through muscle, then it comes out usually by foot through a rather painful process. Agony can last up to 30 days, during which the infected person will try to calm flaring by soaking the affected area in water, which in fact will lead to the release eggs and worm infections reboot cycle.
In the 80s, during a trip to Ghana, former US President Jimmy Carter witnessed a scene that made you take action. "I saw a young woman clutching a baby ... But he was a child - her womb was right," said Carter. "It was the length of a leg. And her nipple coming out of Guinea worm. "The woman had a total of 11 worms in his body. It was an unforgettable scene that made him the American president to set up a nonprofit Carter Center that she had guinea worm eradication mission.
In 1986, there were more than 3.5 million cases of Guinea worm infections worldwide in nearly 24,000 locations in 21 countries in Asia and Afica. Now, after three decades of work, there are only 126 cases were announced at an exhibition at the American Museum of Natural History, called Countdown to Zero: Defeating Disease, from the Carter Center. Moreover, the disease has only been detected in 30 villages in four countries in Africa alone. If this trend continues, Dracunculoza will soon become the first disease eradicated to be without vaccines or medicines.
Dracunculoza is the ideal candidate for eradication because Handelsbanken infection is transmitted only through a single route, and if I lose, the infection can be stopped. In consequence, the strategy was a simple one: to educate residents of the affected villages, distributing cheap filters that could be used to Alimini parasites in the water.
The devices were actually plastic tubes equipped with a filter, a steel mesh, which could take anywhere and use anytime. Also, those who reported cases of people infected were receiving a reward of $ 100, a considerable sum for those places.