Jan.
17, 2013 — Wild animals may be a key contributor to the continuing spread
of African sleeping sickness, new research published in PLOS Computational
Biology shows. The West African form of the disease, also known as
Gambiense Human African trypanosomiasis, affects around 10,000 people in Africa
every year and is deadly if left untreated.
The
disease is caused by a brain-invading parasite transmitted by bites of the
tsetse fly, and gets its name from the hallmark symptoms of drowsiness and
altered sleeping patterns that affect late-stage patients, along with other
physical and neurological manifestations including manic episodes and
hallucinations that eventually lead to coma and death.
Despite
numerous previous studies showing that animals can be infected with the
parasite, the prevailing view has been that the disease persisted in its
traditional areas almost only because of human-to-human transmission. A new
study, from an international team of researchers led by the London School of
Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, challenges this assumption by using a
mathematical model to show that the disease not only can persist in an area
even when there are no human cases, but probably requires the presence of
infected wild animals to maintain the chain of transmission. The authors' model
was based on data collected in active screening campaigns between November 1998
and February 1999 in the Bipindi area of Cameroon.
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