TACLOBAN CITY — The Tacloban City government, through the support of the World Health Organization (WHO), is stepping up the campaign against the spread of schistosomiasis, a parasitic disease that is widespread in Eastern Visayas.

Tacloban City Health Officer (TCHO) Dr. Danilo Ecarma said the new campaign will specifically target children above five years old to participate in the mass drug administration (MDA) in villages where there is presence of snails known to be the intermediate host of the parasite.

Ecarma said that over the last five years, over 400 individuals from Tacloban City were tested positive of schistosomiasis based on laboratory examination conducted at the Governor Benjamin T. Romualdez General Hospital and Schistosomiasis Center, a specialized hospital on schistosomiasis treatment run by the Department of Health (DoH).

“Schistosomiasis remains a public health concern in Eastern Visayas especially here in Tacloban,” Ecarma said, adding that the host snail of the parasite is endemic in 16 of the 132 barangays of the city.

On Tuesday, 20 April, the Tacloban City Health Office, together with the DoH regional office and the WHO, had a conference with the barangay captains, barangay health committees and barangay health workers of the 16 villages to launch a new round of the mass drug administration against schistosomiasis.

Mel Tirso Maravilles, the focal person on schistosomiasis at the TCHO, said the village officials will be tasked to lead the education campaign in their respective communities on the need to increase participation in the mass drug administration.

Maravilles said that while MDA is calendared at the DoH as an activity every January, the city plans to conduct it from January to June to increase the coverage.

“Whether a person is tested positive or not, he has to take the praziquantel as a personal protection and help stop the further spread of the parasite,” he said.

Dr. Ecarma said Tacloban City lags far behind in the coverage of MDA. He said that in the last three years, some villages were only able to accomplish two percent coverage in the MD A, way below the 85 percent coverage of target population recommended by the WHO. He said that among the 16 barangays, the highest accomplishment in MDA is only 28 percent.

Ecarma said among the reasons for the low turnout in MDA is the adverse effect of the medicine which includes headache, dizziness, stomach pain, nausea, tiredness, weakness, joint/muscle pain, loss of appetite, vomiting and sweating.

He said that MDA are administered by nurses in the presence of a doctor so that adverse effects to an individual are immediately attended to.