HTLV-I and Strongyloides in Australia: The worm lurking beneath.

Strongyloidiasis and HTLV-I (human T-lymphotropic virus-1) are important infections that are endemic in many countries around the world with an estimated 370 million infected with Strongyloides stercoralis alone, and 5-10 million with HTVL-I. Co-infections with these pathogens are associated with significant morbidity and can be fatal. HTLV-I infects T-cells thus causing dysregulation of the immune system which has been linked to dissemination and hyperinfection of S.

Cross-Cultural, Aboriginal Language, Discovery Education for Health Literacy and Informed Consent in a Remote Aboriginal Community in the Northern Territory, Australia.

Background: Education for health literacy of Australian Aboriginal people living remotely is challenging as their languages and worldviews are quite different from English language and Western worldviews. Becoming health literate depends on receiving comprehensible information in a culturally acceptable manner.

Methods: The study objective was to facilitate oral health literacy through community education about scabies and strongyloidiasis, including their transmission and control, preceding an ivermectin mass drug administration (MDA) for these diseases.

A comparative study of intestinal helminths in pre-school-age urban and rural children in Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea.

Children aged between 1 month and 10 years from one rural coastal locality, two rural upland localities and two urban localities in Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea were examined between September 1980 and September 1982. Hookworm (predominantly Necator americanus), Ascaris lumbricoides and Trichuris trichiura increased in prevalence with age. The prevalence of Strongyloides fuelleborni subspecies kellyi, where present, was either highest in the < 1 year age group or similar in all age groups.

Effective diagnostic tests and anthelmintic treatment for Strongyloides stercoralis make community control feasible.

Strongyloides stercoralis is endemic in tropical and subtropical countries, and is prevalent particularly in economically impoverished people. Although an estimated 30 to 100 million people world-wide suffer from S. stercoralis infection and it is a life-long disease, it remains a neglected tropical disease.