Fighting Disease:  Mexico

Eliminating Onchocerciasis from the Americas

River blindness is a parasitic disease transmitted by the bite of small black flies that breed in rapidly flowing streams and rivers. The disease causes severe itching, eye damage, and often blindness but is preventable through health education and distribution of the medicine Mectizan®. Learn more about the Carter Center's campaign to eliminate river blindness from the Americas and to control it in Africa >

The Mexico Ministry of Health, in partnership with the Carter Center-sponsored Onchocerciasis Elimination Program of the Americas, Lions Clubs International Foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Merck, has facilitated great successes against river blindness.

Mexico originally had three endemic foci: Oaxaca, Northern Chiapas, and Southern Chiapas. Through 22 consecutive rounds of semiannual distribution of Mectizan® (ivermectin, donated by Merck) and health education, onchocerciasis has been eliminated from Northern Chiapas, and Oaxaca has halted transmission and entered a post-treatment surveillance period.  

In the remaining Mexican foci, Southern Chiapas, since 2003, the Ministry of Health has been conducting a quarterly (every three months) program for mass drug administration to hasten river blindness elimination. This effort was expanded in 2009 and now includes more than 160 communities, reaching 92 percent of the at-risk population. As a result, in 2010, 193,843 Mectizan treatments were delivered with health education in the Southern Chiapas focus, and river blindness transmission there currently is classified as suppressed. Additional assessments are in progress to determine if transmission has been halted.

Watch the video: A Life's Work: Rodrigo Lepe >

Read the Real Lives, Real Change feature: Pitasia Gonzales: Treatment Gives Hope for Grandchildren's Future >

Watch the video: Eliminating River Blindness in the Americas >

Learn more about the Center's work fighting river blindness in Mexico (in search result format) >