More elephantiasis cases found
More elephantiasis cases found
Multa Fidrus, The Jakarta Post, Tangerang
With her hugely swollen left leg, moving around the house is
painful for Toti, 23, a housewife living in Kunciran Induk in
Pinang, Tangerang city.
Contracting elephantiasis eight years ago, Toti has taken all
the medical treatment she can afford to try to bring the
disfiguring swelling in her limb down.
"I took various kinds of colorful pills given by the doctors
at the public health center ... I even went to Sitanala Leprosy
Hospital and consumed all the medicines they gave me. They just
didn't work, so I quit the medicine and have left it up to God,"
she told The Jakarta Post on Monday.
Toti recalled the first days after she contracted the
debilitating disease, caused by tiny worm infestations spread by
the bite of mosquitoes.
"I felt cold, but I sweated a lot ... (the fever) started at
night when it was raining," she said.
The following days, red marks covered her leg. The dots got
bigger as the leg began to swell. Toti began to wear pants to
hide her leg.
Toti is not the only one in the area who has to live with a
permanent disfigurement. Five other people in the subdistrict,
which is located some three kilometers south of the Soekarno-
Hatta International Airport, also suffer from elephantiasis.
An integrated health post (Posyandu) worker, Imas, first found
Toti, Simpen, 60, Masih, 30, Onih, 40, Nasih, 40, and Minah, 32,
all of whom, like Toti, were living at home, having quit taking
medication that didn't work.
Tangerang health agency head Nuriman Mahjudin said that 11
other people with elephantiasis had been found this year in the
Kreo, Cileduk, Sewan, Neglasari, Gombor and Periuk subdistricts
bordering Tangerang city and regency.
While the parasites could be killed, the deformation they
created was generally permanent, he said. Plastic surgery was the
only way to treat the swollen feet, a procedure that was limited
in its effectiveness and which most of the sufferers could not
afford.
Separately, head of contagious disease eradication at the
agency, Lisa Puspa Dewi, said that the agency had recently
examined the blood samples of several people with elephantiasis,
mostly in their legs.
The thread-like, parasitic filarial worms Wuchereria bancrofti
and Brugia malayi that cause lymphatic filariasis or
elephantiasis are transmitted by infected mosquitoes that bite
humans.
According to a World Health Organization (WHO) fact sheet in
November 2000, that year? more than 120 million people worldwide
were affected by elephantiasis, 40 million who were permanently
debilitated. The report said the prevalence of the infections
were continuing to increase due to the rapid and unplanned growth
of cities, with building areas creating breeding sites for the
mosquitoes that transmit the disease.
Lisa said the regional health agency had now formed a medical
team to hold door-to-door checks to detect sufferers early on and
educate the public on how to avoid the disease.
"We will also hold a big treatment clinic for the sufferers
from August to September ... We have started to collect data
about residents who have contracted the disease, going from
subdistrict to subdistrict here."
She said several of the elephantiasis sufferers from Cileduk,
Neglasari and Periuk had earlier been treated at Tangerang
Hospital.
"We have killed the parasite, but returning their legs to
their normal size is difficult because cosmetic surgery can only
mend 30 percent of an elephantiasis leg."