Par SENETOILE NEWS le mercredi 30 janvier 2019
Catégorie: Web NEWS

Africa to review fight against neglected tropical diseases

A ‘league table’ is being drawn up showing how African countries are faring in the fight against neglected tropical diseases (NTDs). NTDs rarely make headline news, yet they affect 1.6 billion people in the poorest parts of the globe – including around 580 million people in Africa. That’s close to 50% of the entire population of Africa. 

On February 10th and 11th African leaders will attend the African Union Summit in Ethiopia. The Summit will include a presentation and a discussion of the African Leaders Malaria Alliance (ALMA) scorecard, a tool which tracks the progress against malaria as well the five most common NTDs, amongst other diseases.

NTDs, such as river blindness and the limb-swelling disease elephantiasis, thrive in areas with poor sanitation and hygiene. They stop children from going to school and adults from going to work by causing debilitating illnesses and mobility problems. This traps millions of people in a vicious cycle of poverty, robbing them of their dignity. NTDs can also be deadly.

But there is good news. Many NTDs can be prevented, treated and even eliminated. The drugs needed to protect people from the NTDs are available free of charge to countries from pharmaceutical companies. For this reason delivering the drugs required only costs around 50 US cents per treatment per person per year, making this one of the best buys in global health (in some cases several rounds of treatment are required).

The league table is drawn from the ALMA scorecard, and both are based on information supplied by the countries themselves. The African leaders’ review of the latest figures is expected to reveal, among other statistics, that:

url ref  : https://unitingtocombatntds.org/

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