Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs)

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The Problem

  • Lymphatic filariasis (LF), more commonly known as elephantiasis, affects over 120 million people and is a threat to one fifth of the world's population in about 80 countries.
  • Although the disease is not life-threatening, the disability and the incapacitating acute attacks caused by LF often leave infected persons unable to work, which can lead to or exacerbate conditions of poverty.

What HKI Is Doing

  • HKI is one of 40 members of the Global Alliance to Eliminate Lymphatic Filariasis, which aims to eliminate LF as a public health problem by 2020 and to alleviate the physical, social and economic hardship that individuals who have LF-induced disability face.
  • Since 2003 in Burkina Faso, HKI has integrated LF control activities into its onchocerciasis control program. With our partners, FDC/Save the Children U.S. and Handicap International, HKI works with the national program in regions where LF prevalence rates reach 72%.
  • In Sierra Leone, the treatment of LF is being integrated into Community-Directed Treatment with Ivermectin (CDTI) nationwide: 30,000 Community Directed Distributors are now distributing both ivermectin and albendazole to treat both onchocerciasis and LF.