MEDICAL practitioners attached to the Linden Hospital Complex (LHC), benefitted from a sensitisation session hosted by the Pan American Health Organisation and the Ministry of Public Health’s Vector Control Service on Mass Drug Administration.
Region 10 will be one of four regions that will be completely targeted in the 2019 Mass Drug Administration (MDA) aimed at eliminating filaria in Guyana by 2020.
Dr Jean Alexandre, Advisor Communicable Disease and Environmental Health, attached to PAHO/WHO, related that the campaign which will held under the slogan, ‘Protect Yourself! Protect your family! Protect your community! TAKE YOUR FILARIA PILLS,’ will be launched on October 12 and will officially commence in Region Four on October 14.
Region 10 is slated to be the last region to be targeted. “Our plan with ending in Region 10, is to have as much sensitisation before we start and to also see if anything that can be learned in the other regions, that can be applied in Region 10…and as Region 10 will be the last region to start, everyone will be free to support Region 10,” said Dr. Alexandre.
Given the fact that the campaign will be using a new drug regimen this year, compared to the previous years’, Dr Alexandre posited that sensitisation sessions as these are pertinent and will be conducted country wide. “I think the main reason the medical doctors in this hospital, they are the face of health in this region, when the doctors understand what is going on, they will be able to relay this information to their patients and these patients to their households, so working with the medical personnel is critical not only in Region 10, but we are doing it country wide.” The 2019 MDA will be using a three-drug preventative chemotherapy, with the aim of giving massive coverage in eight of the 10 administrative regions.
Compared to previous years’ MDA, where two drugs Diethyicarbon (DEC) and Albendazole, were distributed in targeted regions, this year, the new drug regimen will include the pill, Ivermectin.
This regimen is called IDA. Scientific evidence has proven that adding Ivermectin to the two-drug combination, microfilaria is cleared more effectively from the blood. In addition to Regions Four and Ten, Regions Three and Five will be completely targeted; Region’s Six, Seven, One and Two will have selected areas targeted.
