Mass-treatment and insecticide-spraying of animal reservoirs for emergency control of Rhodesiense sleeping sickness in Uganda.

摘要

Human African trypanosomiasis or sleeping sickness is a devastating disease that kills all those infected unless treated. Sleeping sickness tends to affect the poorest and marginalized rural communities with least access to health care. The acute form of the disease caused by T.b. rhodesiense was first recognized in south-east Uganda in 1898. This epidemic which lasted until 1915, led to the death of over 350,000 people in south-eastern Uganda alone. Subsequently, there were a number of sporadic outbreaks of the disease. However, in the 1940s, a second major epidemic of sleeping sickness began in south-east Uganda which led to 2432 cases and 274 deaths. The third major epidemic started in the 1970s and continued up to the end of 1980s. In 1988, sleeping sickness extended to Tororo and Busia districts at the Uganda-Kenya border during which 1180 cases were reported. This epidemic was brought under control by the end of 1990s4. Southeast Uganda still remains the major focus of T.b. rhodesiense sleeping sickness with Glossina fuscipes fuscipes as the major vector