NGO bird catches worms in city kids
NGO bird catches worms in city kids
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
It has taken over 17 years to get worms out of the city's long
list of health problems, seeing a decrease in parasitical
infections among children living in slums to 8 percent this year.
Non-governmental organization Kusuma Buana Foundation, which
is concerned with public health, revealed on Tuesday that they
had been working since 1987 to eradicate intestinal parasite
infections, mostly roundworm (Ascaris lumbricoides), whipworm
(Trichuris trichuira), and hookworm, among elementary school
students.
Focusing on schoolchildren of slums across the city, which are
frequently flooded or where sanitation is poor, the organization
found that 13.8 percent of the children had parasitical
infections in 2002.
"Thousands of students from around 1,500 elementary schools
out of 2,500 schools in Jakarta are vulnerable to getting
infected by parasites," the organization executive Adi Sasongko
said.
He was speaking in a one-day seminar titled: School-based
Parasite Control Program to Improve the Health of the Elementary
Schoolchildren in Indonesia from 2002 to 2005.
Children are most vulnerable to parasitical infections that
can adversely affect their health through a reduction of
nutrients, which can lead to malnutrition and decrease the
child's quality of life and ability to learn.
Kusuma Buana, which has succeeded in reaching 721 elementary
schools in Jakarta from 1987 to 2005 with its parasite awareness
campaigns and health promotions for students, parents, and
teachers, provides laboratory checkups and medication for
students twice a year at each school.
Once a specific school has succeeded in managing parasitical
infections satisfactorily, the focus of the foundation's
activities is shifted to improving the children's nutrition.
To support the program, the Jakarta administration has
subsidized the cost of the laboratory tests and medicine at Rp
15,000 per month for each student.
Supported by the city administration, Kusuma Buana also asked
parents to participate in the program by contributing Rp 1,000
each year for each of their school-age children.
Ida Ayu Puspasari, an assistant resident representative for
collaboration, community empowerment and the environment, of the
Indonesian office of the Japan International Cooperation Agency
(JICA), said that her organization had allocated Rp 1.4 billion
for the three-year project.
"We have seen that Kusuma Buana has established good and well-
managed cooperation and affiliations with several NGOs and
private companies, like Ajinomoto, in Japan. The foundation also
has systematically transferred its knowledge to other local
NGOs," she said.
"Our support for the program will be over by the end of this
month. For the evaluation of the progress of the program, we will
continue monitoring the results of the prevention program among
the students," Ida added.(001)