Think Bigg

Nicholas Kristof ran another great story last week on one of the most easily prevented tropical diseases: worms.

According to the New York Times,

Some 40 million people have H.I.V. or AIDS, and 600 million have hookworms. Here in Congo, one study found that 82 percent of children have worms, and partly as a consequence 70 percent are anemic.

It often costs hundreds of dollars a year to treat a person with AIDS, continuing for as long as the person lives. But it costs 3 cents per year per person for medicine to prevent elephantiasis, which is caused by worm-like creatures and is on my personal top-three list of diseases never to develop.

Elephantiasis causes one’s legs to become grotesquely swollen, looking like an elephant’s, hence its name. And a man’s scrotum balloons so monstrously that in extreme cases the victim needs a wheelbarrow to support it as he walks.

The Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases estimates that more easily preventable and treatable ailments, including worms, elephantiasis and trachoma, kill 500,000 people annually. Indeed, ordinary worms kill 130,000 people a year, through anemia and intestinal obstruction.

More generally, these diseases prevent children from achieving their intellectual or physical potential.

These ailments together can be prevented or treated for just 50 cents per person per year.

The Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases is a partnership formed in 2006 to raise the profile of neglected diseases and to stimulate a paradigm shift in disease control efforts.

Find out how you can be part of the solution with just 50 cents!

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