Yaws, a neglected disease with a nearly forgotten name is making a comeback following a global control programme that almost eradicated it more than 40 years ago.
Yaws, a disease which eats away at the skin, cartilage and bones of its victims (mostly children), is re-emerging in poor, rural and marginalized populations of Africa, Asia and South America.
Today, more than 500 000 are afflicted by yaws, which is caused by a spiral bacteria that penetrates through a cut in the skin resulting in bumps that burst, ulcerate and spread over the body.
In the 1950s, more than 50 million people worldwide were afflicted by the disease until WHO, in partnership with UNICEF, established a massive global control programme to eliminate it. The Global Yaws Control Programme, fully operational between 1952 and 1964, succeeded in treating 300 million people in 50 countries – reducing global levels of the disease by more than 95% and virtually eradicating yaws. However, after the programme’s enormous success, sustained surveillance of yaws diminished, which has now given way to its resurgence in the 21st century.
Yaws is transmitted from person to person via skin contact or through breaks in the skin caused by injuries or bites which allow the spiral bacteria to penetrate. It is a debilitating disease whose effects in its young victims (mostly children under 15 years of age) can often cause gross deformation. Lesions develop that eat bone, cartilage, skin and soft tissue, leaving victims with gaping holes where their lips or noses should be.
“The persistence of yaws in the 21st century is unacceptable;” says Dr Lorenzo Savioli, WHO Director of Neglected Tropical Diseases. “There is a cost-effective approach to treating this disease.” Yaws is treated by a single dose of long-acting penicillin that costs as little as 32 US cents. Experts believe that yaws can be eliminated and eventually eradicated because humans are the only reservoir of infection.