Intestinal worms or parasitic worms, are simple organisms that dwell in human bodies and feed on them. The worms cause diseases like Schistosomiasis and Soil Transmitted Helminthiasis (STH).
Schistosomiasis, one of the Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs), is a parasitic disease caused by parasitic worms that can cause acute and chronic infection while Soil Transmitted Helminthiasis (STH) is caused by infection with a group of intestinal nematode worms.
The disease, which is prevalent in rural communities can be contracted through contaminated food and water while STH is transmitted by the fecal oral route and by skin penetration, according to experts.
The deputy director/programme manager, Schistosomiasis and Soil Transmitted Helminthiasis Elimination Programme, Federal Ministry of Health, Dr. Obiageli Nebe, said though neglected, Schistosomiasis and STH cause chronic infections and infants and children are prone to the infections due to their less developed immune system while stressing the need for regular deworming, especially for children.
She said “These parasites are known to have detrimental impact on child health as they deplete nutrients in children and adversely affect physical and cognitive development, causing symptoms such as abdominal pain, anaemia, bladder, liver diseases and other health problems which impair growth, reduced school attendance with poor learning outcome,” she explained.
With Nigeria having the highest burden of tropical diseases in Africa, Nebe said massive deworming exercise has been initiated in the country, stating that deworming can improve children’s school participation, growth, and nutritional intake.
“Deworming tablets improve health, appetite, and energy levels, reduce school absenteeism, and improve the learning ability of children,” she said.
The common deworming medicine is Albendazole, which is taken as 200mg at once for children and 400mg for adults.
However, Nebe said the disease can be prevented by wearing of shoes, regular washing of hands thoroughly with soap and water after using the latrine and before eating, proper food preparation and storage, filtering or treating contaminated drinking water, and keeping schools and households feces free.
In the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) for instance, a coalition of Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), in 2020 said that over 50 percent of children across the six area councils in the FCT were infected with schistosomiasis.
The CSOs identified open defection and poor hygiene practices as factors responsible for the intestinal worm infection, saying that two of the area councils; Gwagwalada and Kwali, were also endemic to soil transmitted helminths.
Reacting to this, Nebe noted that significant gap still exist in treatment due to low scale up of interventions in all endemic LGAs, data gap and under treatment of hot spots/high burden communities within endemic LGAs.
On the way forward, she advocated for sustained and retained effective therapeutic and geographic coverage, disaggregation of Schistosomiasis mapping data into sub-districts (wards) for more objective planning and implementation.
