where we work
Appreciating the link between a healthy population and a healthy democracy, Senegal invited The Carter Center to assist it in eliminating Guinea worm disease. Together, The Carter Center and Senegal made history by bringing the nation to the forefront of a global disease eradication movement.
Current Status:Transmission stopped, 1997
Certification of Dracunculiasis Elimination: 2004
In 1992, The Carter Center began providing financial and technical assistance to the Ministry of Health in Senegal to stop Guinea worm in the country.
Approaches introduced in local communities included: health education; distribution of nylon filters to strain out water fleas that host the infected larvae; safe, monthly treatment of stagnant ponds with ABATE® larvicide (donated by BASF); direct advocacy with water organizations; and increased efforts to build safer hand-dug wells. Village volunteers, who were trained, supplied, and supervised by the program, carried out monthly surveillance and interventions.
Through these efforts, Senegal stopped transmission of Guinea worm disease in 1997 and was officially certified by the World Health Organization as Guinea worm-free in 2004.
Senegal was honored at a special ceremony at The Carter Center in Atlanta in 2000 for having stopped Guinea worm disease transmission.
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