Cash reward offered for reporting cases of Guinea Worm Disease
What you need to know:
- The campaign against GWD will be done in Turkana, West Pokot and Trans Nzoia.
- The disease is spread by drinking water contaminated with Guinea worm larvae and has no drug or vaccine.
The Ministry of Health has offered Sh100,000 reward to anyone who will report a case of Guinea Worm Disease (GWD) in any part of the country.
The Ministry says Kenya is the only country in East Africa that has not received certification of eradicating the disease.
The country has embarked on a campaign to eradicate the disease in a bid to receive the certification by 2016.
The last case was reported in Turkana in 2005. The campaign against GWD will be done in Turkana, West Pokot and Trans Nzoia.
The Ministry says the campaign aims to ensure that the disease is not spread from the neighbouring Ethiopia and South Sudan.
The disease is spread by drinking water contaminated with Guinea worm larvae, and has no drug or vaccine.
According to the World Health Organisation, the female worm emerges, usually from the feet, to release thousands of eggs.
“The worm eventually emerges (from the feet in most of the cases), causing an intensely painful oedema, a blister and an ulcer accompanied by fever, nausea and vomiting,” WHO states in its website.
