Schistosomiasis Elimination: Beginning of the End or a Continued March on a Trodden Path

Abstract

In spite of spectacular progress towards the goal of elimination of schistosomiasis, particularly in China but also in other areas, research gaps and outstanding issues remain. Although expectations of achieving elimination of this disease have never been greater, all constraints have not been swept aside. Indeed, there are some formidable obstacles, such as insufficient amounts of drugs to treat everybody and still limited use of high-sensitive diagnostic techniques, both for the definitive and the intermediate hosts, which indicate that prevalence is considerably underrated in well-controlled areas. Elimination will be difficult to achieve without a broad approach, including a stronger focus on transmission, better diagnostics and the establishment of a reliable survey system activating a rapid response when called for. Importantly, awareness of the crucial importance of transmission has been revived resulting in renewed interest in snail control together with more emphasis on health education and sanitation. The papers collected in this special issue entitled ‘Prospects for Schistosomiasis Elimination’ reflect these issues and we are particularly pleased to note that some also discuss the crucial question when to declare a country free of schistosomiasis and present techniques that together create an approach that can show unequivocally when interruption of transmission has been achieved.

Human rights as a framework for eliminating female genital schistosomiasis

“…Eliminating FGS as a public health problem will also require scientific research to fill critical knowledge gaps, including those around the management and treatment of long-term sequelae and the development and distribution of new interventions, including vaccine technologies and alternatives to praziquantel [ 36 ]. Such an imperative for future research implicates the right to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress in translating research findings into treatment and distribution [ 37 ].…”

Zoonotic Trematode Infections; Their Biology, Intermediate Hosts and Control

“…Schistosomiasis is native in many countries in Africa, South America, and Asia with an estimated number of 200 million infected people and with 800 million being at risk according to Doumenge et al [4], but considering the population increase since then, the number of humans currently at risk must be well over a billion [5]. According to latest available information somewhere between 230 and 250 million people are actually infected [6,7].…”

Adherence to diagnosis followed by selective treatment of schistosomiasis mansoni and related knowledge among schoolchildren in an endemic area of Minas Gerais, Brazil, prior to and after the implementation of educational actions

“…It is consensus that treatment conjugated to sanitation and safe water supply are the most effective measures to eliminate schistosomiasis ( Al Ghahtani and Amin, 2005 ; N'Diaye et al, 2016 ; Shiff, 2017 ; Bergquist and Gray, 2019 ). The sustainability of these measures may be enhanced if they are associated to educational health initiatives capable of considering local specificities ( Schall, 1987 ; Massara and Schall, 2004 ; Ejike et al, 2017 ; Sun et al, 2017 ; Inobaya et al, 2018 ; Hailu et al, 2018 ; Appleby et al, 2019 ).…”