Credit score: Unsplash/CC0 Public Area
Kenya has eradicated sleeping illness as a public well being downside, the World Well being Group introduced on Friday, making it the tenth nation to take action.
The vector-borne illness, formally known as human African trypanosomiasis, is endemic in sub-Saharan Africa. With out therapy, HAT is mostly deadly, the WHO says.
Sleeping illness is transmitted to people via the bites of tsetse flies which have acquired the blood parasite Trypanosoma brucei from contaminated people or animals.
Rural populations depending on agriculture, fishing, animal husbandry or searching are deemed most susceptible to publicity.
“I congratulate the government and people of Kenya on this landmark achievement,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus mentioned in a press release.
“Kenya joins the growing ranks of countries freeing their populations of HAT. This is another step toward making Africa free of neglected tropical diseases.”
The parasites can cross the blood-brain barrier into the central nervous system.
Usually that is when extra apparent indicators and signs of HAT seem, says the WHO: conduct adjustments, confusion, sensory disturbances and poor coordination. Sleep cycle disturbance, which provides the illness its identify, is a outstanding characteristic.
The primary circumstances in Kenya have been detected within the early twentieth century.
Apart from Kenya, the others which have now eradicated sleeping illness as a public well being downside are Benin, Chad, Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Rwanda, Togo and Uganda.
© 2025 AFP
Quotation:
Kenya has eradicated sleeping illness, says WHO (2025, August 9)
retrieved 9 August 2025
from https://medicalxpress.com/information/2025-08-kenya-sickness.html
This doc is topic to copyright. Aside from any honest dealing for the aim of personal research or analysis, no
half could also be reproduced with out the written permission. The content material is supplied for data functions solely.
