Disease ravaging Pygmies
2004-05-05 20:05
Paris - Pygmies holed up in remote forests in the Republic of Congo are being ravaged by a "flesh-eating disease" that could be prevented just by washing with soap and water, New Scientist reports in next Saturday's issue.
A team of UN health workers, making the arduous trip to the Likouala region in March, found that as many as half of the 6 000 local Pygmies there, a community known as the Babenga, have the disease, it says.
The ailment, known as bush yaws or pian, develops when a highly contagious germ, Treponema pertenue, infects cuts and grazes, causing lesions that can destroy skin and bone.
It seldom kills directly but can so disfigure its victims that they often hide themselves away out of shame.
Bush yaws has been wiped out in most tropical countries but remains a problem in areas where people are too poor to afford soap. It can be cured by a single shot of penicillin.
Even so, the team, organised by the UN Children's Fund Unicef, was only able to treat 135 people before funds ran out, the British weekly says. It hopes to stage another mission to the area in June.
The estimated several hundred thousand Pygmies that remain in western and central Africa have already been badly hit by civil wars, unrest and logging, driving them out of their traditional homes in the forest.
"Many now live on the outskirts of non-pygmy villages, often in conditions of slavery," New Scientist notes.
In the neighbouring Democratic of Congo, the state prosecutor unveiled a probe in January into allegations that Pygmies in the northeast of the country were being killed and eaten.