![Boosting Female Farmer’s Physical Fitness With a Low-cost Anti-hookworm Drug Boosting Female Farmer’s Physical Fitness With a Low-cost Anti-hookworm Drug](https://images.medindia.net/health-images/1200_1000/malaria-and-hookworms.jpg)
‘When female farmers infected with hookworms received just one 400 milligram dose of albendazole, their overall physical fitness improved significantly.’
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Published in The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, the study confirms that women should be included in mass drug treatment campaigns, said the researchers. ![twitter](https://images.medindia.net/icons/news/social/twitter.png)
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The study was conducted in the Democratic Republic of Congo by a team of researchers that included co-author Michael Cappello, M.D., professor of pediatrics, microbial pathogenesis, and public health at the Yale School of Medicine, and lead author Margaret Salmon, M.D., an emergency medicine specialist and director of InnovationsCZ. Yale School of Public Health researcher Debbie Humphries and Yale Department of Pediatrics researcher Lisa Harrison also contributed to the study.
The team found that when female farmers infected with hookworms received just one 400 milligram dose of albendazole, their overall physical fitness improved significantly. The authors say the results of treatment could be twofold: improved health for farming women and increased food production for women who have the stamina to farm more efficiently.
An estimated 500 million people in the world are infected with hookworm, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Pharmaceutical companies have provided at low-cost, or donated billions of doses of albendazole in low-income countries where disease is endemic. But public health campaigns currently target school-age children.
In this study, the team looked at whether women of child-bearing age -- who may be especially vulnerable to hookworm -- should be included in mass drug treatment campaigns targeting the infections, which are acquired from contact with soil contaminated with human sewage. The worms feed on blood and cause chronic anemia.
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The study reports that after treatment with albendazole, infected women farmers saw their heart rates drop by about 10 beats per minute when doing a simple exercise test.
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Cappello notes that the fact that women who showed improvement in the study had relatively light infections before treatment could indicate that these other effects of hookworm -- the inflammation and impaired digestion -- inflict serious harm as well and can be triggered by even a low level of hookworms in the gut.
Currently, given the low cost and general safety of albendazole, the World Health Organization recommends that school-age children and non-pregnant women of childbearing age in hookworm-endemic communities receive a single 400-milligram dose of the drug once or twice a year. However, Cappello noted that most countries have yet to adopt these recommendations for women.
"There is strong evidence that children with moderate to heavy hookworm infections derive significant physical and developmental gains from effective treatment," said Cappello. "Far less is known about the benefits of broadly treating people like the women who participated in this study, who have a lighter burden of parasites."
Source-Eurekalert