Irreversibly blinding around 300,000 people in west and central Africa, the worm causing it is increasingly breeding in fast-flowing rivers, and has already infected around 18 million people! Rising worries among the scientists, to add to the crisis with 99 percent of those with river blindness – also called onchocerciasis — living in Africa, the parasitic-culprit is emerging resistant to its curative treatments.
Currently risking a further 125 million people from infection, patients are found to be failing to respond to ivermectin treatment!
The reason? — The drug-resistant river blindness-causing parasite’s — Onchocerca volvulus – disastrous emergence.
According to recent studies, the ivermectin resistance is linked to certain genetic markers, precisely the a-tubulin gene. Yes, the parasite causing the disease is becoming resistant to the river blindness-treating standard drug — Ivermectin – which in turn is causing genetic changes in it.
Is it the mass treatment of river blindness for up to 18 years with Ivermectin that has led to this growing resistance?
Though the reason behind the growing resistance of the parasites to the drug is not yet known, Ivermectin’s being the only safe drug available for mass treatment is raising worries among the scientists.
With the increasing drug-resistant river blindness parasite along with its outbreak, the scenario has already endangered an estimated 37 million people already infected with the O. volvulus parasite.