Biannually School Based Deworming by Mebendazole 500mg has Reduced the Worm Load Drastically in Bangladesh

Abstract

Bangladesh being in the tropical zone and having all the risk factors of all parasitic diseases harbors the biggest load of the parasitic disease burden. All 64 districts are endemic with 78 million infected with Ascaris lumbricoides (Round worm) which constituted 55% of population. About 51 million people (35% of population) are infected with Hook worm and 66 million people are infected with Trichuris trichiura (Whip worm) [1,2]. Among all the community 5-14 years age group are very vulnerable to the infection. It causes impairment of growth, development of cognition among Children. Hook worm and whip worm infection cause iron deficiency aneamia. Prior to the initiation of programmatic activities, schools in three districts began piloting deworming programs in 2005 covering three ecological zones of the country (plain, coastal and hilly). The results found 79.8% of the Children were infected. In addition, 43.6% had moderate heavy intensities of Ascaris infections and 16.2% had moderate heavy intensities of Trichuris Trichiura infections. Another follow up survey was conducted in 2007 in same places adding three more districts where deworming was done during MDA under Filariasis elimination program .The three districts were Panchagarh, Nilphamari and Lalmonirhat. The sample size was 1515. The following results were observed. 76.02% school children were found with no infection, 18.65% with single, 4.91% with double and 0.39% with triple infection.