ID4U Episode 31 Human African Trypanosomiasis

Thanks, Lawrence.

This is a textbook presentation of sleeping sickness.

When a clinician encounters a patient with this constellation of prolonged fever, winter bottom sign, behavioral changes, and sleep-wake reversal in sub-Saharan Africa, what should immediately come to mind?

Well, this case illustrates the classic evolution of human African trypanosomiasis, which is abbreviated as HAT, called HAT.

Heart is a vector-borne parasitic disease which is caused by an extracellular protozoa belonging to the genus Trypanosoma brucei that is transmitted to humans through the bite of an infected setsy fly of the genus Glossina.

Historically, setsy flies were nicknamed canoe flies or elephant flies because...

They swarm in dense, shady vegetations along rivers and waterholes, where humans gather to fish, farm, or fetch water.

Pastoralist communities historically avoided infested riverbanks or burned bush-to-clear-set-sea-fly habitats.

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, sleeping sickness caused devastating epidemics across sub-Saharan Africa, killing hundreds of thousands.

Another major resurgence occurred in the 1990s, with over 37,000 reported cases in 1998 alone, and estimated two cases reaching 10 times higher due to an unmonitored rural foci.

That resurgence in the late 1990s was staggering, but over the last 25 years, sustained mobile team surveillance, rapid diagnostic screening, vector control, and international partnerships like the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative have brought reported cases down below 1,000 annually since 2018.

Lawrence, what are the current elimination targets established by the World Health Organization?

Well, the World Health Organization roadmap for neglected tropical diseases targets the complete elimination of transmission for trypanosomal bruiser gambiancy by 2030, meaning zero human cases, and the elimination of trypanosomal bruiser rodiancy as a public health problem by the same date.

We are genuinely on the threshold of making sleeping sickness a disease of the past.

Thanks, Lawrence.

This is a textbook presentation of sleeping sickness.

When a clinician encounters a patient with this constellation of prolonged fever, winter bottom sign, behavioral changes, and sleep-wake reversal in sub-Saharan Africa, what should immediately come to mind?

Well, this case illustrates the classic evolution of human African trypanosomiasis, which is abbreviated as HAT, called HAT.

Heart is a vector-borne parasitic disease which is caused by an extracellular protozoa belonging to the genus Trypanosoma brucei that is transmitted to humans through the bite of an infected setsy fly of the genus Glossina.

Historically, setsy flies were nicknamed canoe flies or elephant flies because...

They swarm in dense, shady vegetations along rivers and waterholes, where humans gather to fish, farm, or fetch water.

Pastoralist communities historically avoided infested riverbanks or burned bush-to-clear-set-sea-fly habitats.

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, sleeping sickness caused devastating epidemics across sub-Saharan Africa, killing hundreds of thousands.

Another major resurgence occurred in the 1990s, with over 37,000 reported cases in 1998 alone, and estimated two cases reaching 10 times higher due to an unmonitored rural foci.

That resurgence in the late 1990s was staggering, but over the last 25 years, sustained mobile team surveillance, rapid diagnostic screening, vector control, and international partnerships like the Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative have brought reported cases down below 1,000 annually since 2018.

Lawrence, what are the current elimination targets established by the World Health Organization?

Well, the World Health Organization roadmap for neglected tropical diseases targets the complete elimination of transmission for trypanosomal bruiser gambiancy by 2030, meaning zero human cases, and the elimination of trypanosomal bruiser rodiancy as a public health problem by the same date.

We are genuinely on the threshold of making sleeping sickness a disease of the past.