Collaborative Research and Training Centre for NTDs, Arba Minch University, Arba Minch, Ethiopia.
Neglected Tropical Diseases, Federal Ministry of Health, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
PLoS One. 2020 Jun 26;15(6):e0235281. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0235281. eCollection 2020.
Soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections remain the most common neglected tropical diseases among children living mainly in low-resource settings. Preventive chemotherapy (PC) has been implemented as one of the main public health interventions to control and eliminate STH infections. Although data on routine coverage of PC against STH are available at different level of the health system; these data are unreliable as they are subject to errors and manipulation and evidence is lacking on validated treatment coverage. Thus, this study aimed to determine anthelminthic coverage among school age children (SAC) to inform decision made in PC program implementation.
We conducted a community-based cross-sectional coverage survey in ten districts of Ethiopia; in April 2019. Sample size was computed automatically using Coverage Survey Builder (CSB) tool in Microsoft excel. Thirty segments were randomly selected per each selected districts. Collected data were cleaned and analysed using SPSS software (IBM, version 25).
In all, 8154 SAC participated in the study. The overall anthelminthic coverage was found to be 71% (95%confidence interval (CI) = 70-71.9%). The reported coverage was lower than the surveyed coverage only in Guagusa district. The PC coverage among males (71.9%) was slightly higher than females' coverage (70%); and the coverage in the age group between10 and 14 years (77%) was higher compared with the age group between 5 and 9 years (64.3%). In addition, the PC coverage in school attending children (81.1%) was much higher than coverage in non-enrolled children (28.3%). Moreover, the most frequently mentioned reasons for not swallowing drugs were drug not given (24.75%) and not attending school (19.75%).
This study showed that only five out of ten districts met the target threshold (minimum 75%) for effective coverage. Hence, implementations of preventive chemotherapy should be improved in those districts with low coverage data.
土壤传播性蠕虫（STH）感染仍然是主要生活在资源匮乏环境中的儿童中最常见的被忽视热带病。预防性化疗（PC）已作为控制和消除 STH 感染的主要公共卫生干预措施之一实施。尽管在不同的卫生系统层面都有针对 STH 的常规 PC 覆盖率数据；但由于这些数据容易出现错误和操纵，并且缺乏经过验证的治疗覆盖率证据，因此这些数据并不可靠。因此，本研究旨在确定学龄儿童（SAC）的驱虫覆盖率，为 PC 项目实施中的决策提供信息。
我们于 2019 年 4 月在埃塞俄比亚的十个地区进行了一项基于社区的横断面覆盖率调查。使用 Microsoft excel 中的 Coverage Survey Builder（CSB）工具自动计算样本量。每个选定的地区随机选择 30 个段。使用 SPSS 软件（IBM，版本 25）对收集的数据进行清理和分析。
共有 8154 名 SAC 参与了研究。总体驱虫覆盖率为 71%（95%置信区间[CI] = 70-71.9%）。仅在 Guagusa 区报告的覆盖率低于调查的覆盖率。男性的 PC 覆盖率（71.9%）略高于女性的覆盖率（70%）；年龄在 10 至 14 岁之间的儿童（77%）的覆盖率高于 5 至 9 岁之间的儿童（64.3%）。此外，在校儿童（81.1%）的 PC 覆盖率远高于未入学儿童（28.3%）。此外，提到未服用药物的最常见原因是未给予药物（24.75%）和未上学（19.75%）。
本研究表明，只有十分之五的地区达到了有效覆盖率（最低 75%）的目标阈值。因此，应提高覆盖率数据较低的地区的预防性化疗实施。
