Correspondents' Correspondence Black Fly War
LAND, THOMAS
Black Fly War Geneva—The first villagers are cautiously returning to their homes in West Africa's Volta River basin, marking the end of the initial phase of an international campaign to rid that...
...Entomological studies by the World Health Organization (WHO) concluded that the flies were vulnerable to pesticides because their breeding grounds could be precisely identified...
...Black Fly War Geneva—The first villagers are cautiously returning to their homes in West Africa's Volta River basin, marking the end of the initial phase of an international campaign to rid that potentially rich agricultural region of onchocercosis...
...The disease, popularly known as "river blindness," is carried by a tiny black fly that usually lays its eggs in fast-flowing waters...
...As a result, much of the fertile river basin-some 700,000 square kilometers encompassing parts of Benin, Ghana, the Ivory Coast, Mali, Niger, Togo, and Upper Volta—has been virtually abandoned for the unproductive plateaus...
...At the moment, though, the total elimination of river blindness remains the primary concern of the program.—Thomas Land...
...In addition, research is being co-ordinated here for the development of new drugs to be deployed in the mass treatment of populations suffering from the disease...
...The WHO specialists also found that Abate, a biodegradable pesticide harmless to humans and most other organisms, was lethal to black fly larvae, permitting large-scale eradication...
...New agricultural techniques will need to be brought into the area, along with schools, medical clinics, roads, and water supplies...
...For the potential economic and social benefits of these efforts to be realized, however, the project must develop a whole new infrastructure in the Volta River basin...
...moreover, there have been no reported new cases in children under age five...
...In 1973 the seven African nations approved a 20-year, $120 million reclamation program to be administered by several UN specialized agencies...
...When the parasites reach the eye, they cause lesions which most often cost victims their sight if not treated...
...With financing from the World Bank as well as a host of individual nations, it was launched the following year and its success to date has surpassed the planners' greatest expectations: In more than three-quarters of the region, the spread of the disease has been effectively arrested...
...The villages being reopened now could well provide the model...
...More than 70,000 inhabitants of the area have been completely blinded by it and nearly a million more have been otherwise crippled...
...Human blood is essential for the survival of the feared black fly...
...As it bites its victims, it deposits thread-like worms under the skin that form nodules, while their larvae spread throughout the body...
Vol. 63 • January 1980 • No. 2
