Preventive chemotherapy coverage against soil-transmitted helminth infection among school age children: Implications from coverage validation survey in Ethiopia, 2019

Abstract

Background Soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections remain the most common neglected tropical diseases among children living mainly in low-resource settings. Preventive chemotherapy (PC) has been implemented as one of the main public health interventions to control and eliminate STH infections. Although data on routine coverage of PC against STH are available at different level of the health system; these data are unreliable as they are subject to errors and manipulation and evidence is lacking on validated treatment coverage. Thus, this study aimed to determine anthelminthic coverage among school age children (SAC) to inform decision made in PC program implementation. Methods We conducted a community-based cross-sectional coverage survey in ten districts of Ethiopia; in April 2019. Sample size was computed automatically using Coverage Survey Builder (CSB) tool in Microsoft excel. Thirty segments were randomly selected per each selected districts. Collected data were cleaned and analysed using SPSS software (IBM, version 25).

Evaluating Equity and Coverage in Mass Drug Administration for Soil-Transmitted Helminth Infections among School-Age Children in the Hard-to-Reach Setting of Southern Ethiopia

“…This may have been due to the fact that reported coverage is often subject to error. The finding collaborates with studies conducted in other parts of Ethiopia, 19 in other countries, 20 and in Bangladesh. 21 In this study, slightly higher MDA coverage in boys was observed thangirls (28.5% versus 26.5%).…”

“… 18 Likewise, it was much lower than the coverage estimated by a study done in ten districts of Ethiopia (71%). 19 However, coverage was in alignment with that in different countries using 2016 WHO PC data, where 31 countries achieved <75% MDA coverage, including Ethiopia. On the other hand, 57 countries achieved ≥75% PC coverage 18 Similarly, in 2017, a WHO report noted that 36 countries met the target.…”

“…On the contrary, a study conducted in another part of Ethiopia showed that children aged >10years had a higher chance of obtaining drugs. 19 In this study, children who were informed on the location and time of MDA had a higher chance of drug uptake than those informed only of the time the drug was planned to be delivered. It is obvious that those participants who got information on the place and time of deworming would be able to access the drugs effectively and efficiently.…”

“…As this study adopted coverage-evaluation survey methodology, sample size was estimated using multistage cluster sampling following WHO guidelines to evaluate coverage and equity of MDA. 18 The Survey Sample Builder tool was used, which generates an equal probability proportional to each village of the survey population by assuming expected coverage of 71% 19 by considering desired precision of 5%, α =5%, design effect of 3, and 10% nonresponse rate. Figure 1 shows the sampling strategy.…”

Soil-transmitted helminth infections among pre-school aged children in Gamo Gofa zone, Southern Ethiopia: Prevalence, intensity and intervention status

“…Furthermore, in our study, gaps in the intervention against STH among PSAC were highlighted. The treatment coverage of ALB in this survey against STH among PSAC was (68.7%); which is lower than the national coverage (71%) of Ethiopia and WHO's target (minimum of 75%) [15,38]. The possible explanation for the unmet target of PC coverage could be driven by low knowledge of the community regarding the benefits of PC on STH prevention.…”