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  • Title: Onchocerciasis control: the APOC strategy.
    Author: Dadzie KY.
    Journal: Afr Health; 1997 Mar; 19(3):13-5. PubMed ID: 12292398.
    Abstract:
    Onchocerciasis represents a serious public health problem in tropical Africa and parts of Central and South America and Yemen. The adult female parasite lives an average of 10-11 years in the human host, producing millions of microfilariae that invade the tissues of the skin and eye. There is a strong association between the parasite load and the severity of the clinical manifestations of the disease. Of the approximately 17.5 million Africans affected by the disease, 15 million live in the 19 countries participating in the African Program for Onchocerciasis Control (APOC). In the APOC countries, up to 600,000 people are blind or have severe visual impairment and 80% of the total population suffers from onchocercal skin disease and itching. The remaining victims live in the 11 countries of the Onchocerciasis Control Program in West Africa (OCP), where the parasite is on the brink of being eliminated--a factor that has benefited socioeconomic development. The OCP combined vector control with use of the microfilaricide ivermectin. APOC has set the goal of establishing within the next 12 years effective, sustainable, community-based ivermectin treatment programs as well as environmentally safe vector control. An overall coverage rate of 70% of the target population is required for eventual elimination of the disease. Since ivermectin does not interrupt transmission of infection, the regimen must be continued for at least 20 years to ensure long-term control. The rapid epidemiological mapping method has been used to delineate the endemicity levels in most APOC countries.
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