Financial and Economic Costs of the Elimination and Eradication of Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa.
BACKGROUND:Onchocerciasis (river blindness) is a parasitic disease transmitted by blackflies. Symptoms include severe itching, skin lesions, and vision impairment including blindness. More than 99% of all cases are concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa. Fortunately, vector control and community-directe...
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ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:22c9a3404eb04e72b252b79051707491 2023-05-15T15:11:44+02:00 Financial and Economic Costs of the Elimination and Eradication of Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa. Young Eun Kim Elisa Sicuri Fabrizio Tediosi 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0004056 https://doaj.org/article/22c9a3404eb04e72b252b79051707491 EN eng Public Library of Science (PLoS) http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4567329?pdf=render https://doaj.org/toc/1935-2727 https://doaj.org/toc/1935-2735 1935-2727 1935-2735 doi:10.1371/journal.pntd.0004056 https://doaj.org/article/22c9a3404eb04e72b252b79051707491 PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, Vol 9, Iss 9, p e0004056 (2015) Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine RC955-962 Public aspects of medicine RA1-1270 article 2015 ftdoajarticles https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0004056 2022-12-30T20:49:56Z BACKGROUND:Onchocerciasis (river blindness) is a parasitic disease transmitted by blackflies. Symptoms include severe itching, skin lesions, and vision impairment including blindness. More than 99% of all cases are concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa. Fortunately, vector control and community-directed treatment with ivermectin have significantly decreased morbidity, and the treatment goal is shifting from control to elimination in Africa. METHODS:We estimated financial resources and societal opportunity costs associated with scaling up community-directed treatment with ivermectin and implementing surveillance and response systems in endemic African regions for alternative treatment goals--control, elimination, and eradication. We used a micro-costing approach that allows adjustment for time-variant resource utilization and for the heterogeneity in the demographic, epidemiological, and political situation. RESULTS:The elimination and eradication scenarios, which include scaling up treatments to hypo-endemic and operationally challenging areas at the latest by 2021 and implementing intensive surveillance, would allow savings of $1.5 billion and $1.6 billion over 2013-2045 as compared to the control scenario. Although the elimination and eradication scenarios would require higher surveillance costs ($215 million and $242 million) than the control scenario ($47 million), intensive surveillance would enable treatments to be safely stopped earlier, thereby saving unnecessary costs for prolonged treatments as in the control scenario lacking such surveillance and response systems. CONCLUSIONS:The elimination and eradication of onchocerciasis are predicted to allow substantial cost-savings in the long run. To realize cost-savings, policymakers should keep empowering community volunteers, and pharmaceutical companies would need to continue drug donation. To sustain high surveillance costs required for elimination and eradication, endemic countries would need to enhance their domestic funding capacity. Societal and ... Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles Arctic PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases 9 9 e0004056 |
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Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles |
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Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine RC955-962 Public aspects of medicine RA1-1270 |
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Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine RC955-962 Public aspects of medicine RA1-1270 Young Eun Kim Elisa Sicuri Fabrizio Tediosi Financial and Economic Costs of the Elimination and Eradication of Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa. |
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Arctic medicine. Tropical medicine RC955-962 Public aspects of medicine RA1-1270 |
description |
BACKGROUND:Onchocerciasis (river blindness) is a parasitic disease transmitted by blackflies. Symptoms include severe itching, skin lesions, and vision impairment including blindness. More than 99% of all cases are concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa. Fortunately, vector control and community-directed treatment with ivermectin have significantly decreased morbidity, and the treatment goal is shifting from control to elimination in Africa. METHODS:We estimated financial resources and societal opportunity costs associated with scaling up community-directed treatment with ivermectin and implementing surveillance and response systems in endemic African regions for alternative treatment goals--control, elimination, and eradication. We used a micro-costing approach that allows adjustment for time-variant resource utilization and for the heterogeneity in the demographic, epidemiological, and political situation. RESULTS:The elimination and eradication scenarios, which include scaling up treatments to hypo-endemic and operationally challenging areas at the latest by 2021 and implementing intensive surveillance, would allow savings of $1.5 billion and $1.6 billion over 2013-2045 as compared to the control scenario. Although the elimination and eradication scenarios would require higher surveillance costs ($215 million and $242 million) than the control scenario ($47 million), intensive surveillance would enable treatments to be safely stopped earlier, thereby saving unnecessary costs for prolonged treatments as in the control scenario lacking such surveillance and response systems. CONCLUSIONS:The elimination and eradication of onchocerciasis are predicted to allow substantial cost-savings in the long run. To realize cost-savings, policymakers should keep empowering community volunteers, and pharmaceutical companies would need to continue drug donation. To sustain high surveillance costs required for elimination and eradication, endemic countries would need to enhance their domestic funding capacity. Societal and ... |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Young Eun Kim Elisa Sicuri Fabrizio Tediosi |
author_facet |
Young Eun Kim Elisa Sicuri Fabrizio Tediosi |
author_sort |
Young Eun Kim |
title |
Financial and Economic Costs of the Elimination and Eradication of Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa. |
title_short |
Financial and Economic Costs of the Elimination and Eradication of Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa. |
title_full |
Financial and Economic Costs of the Elimination and Eradication of Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa. |
title_fullStr |
Financial and Economic Costs of the Elimination and Eradication of Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa. |
title_full_unstemmed |
Financial and Economic Costs of the Elimination and Eradication of Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa. |
title_sort |
financial and economic costs of the elimination and eradication of onchocerciasis (river blindness) in africa. |
publisher |
Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
publishDate |
2015 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0004056 https://doaj.org/article/22c9a3404eb04e72b252b79051707491 |
geographic |
Arctic |
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Arctic |
genre |
Arctic |
genre_facet |
Arctic |
op_source |
PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, Vol 9, Iss 9, p e0004056 (2015) |
op_relation |
http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4567329?pdf=render https://doaj.org/toc/1935-2727 https://doaj.org/toc/1935-2735 1935-2727 1935-2735 doi:10.1371/journal.pntd.0004056 https://doaj.org/article/22c9a3404eb04e72b252b79051707491 |
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https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0004056 |
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PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases |
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