Managing morbidity and preventing disability in the Global Programme to Eliminate Lymphatic Filariasis: WHO position statement

Overview

Why manage morbidity and prevent disability?
In 1997, the World Health Assembly resolved to eliminate lymphatic filariasis as a public-health problem. In 2000, WHO established the Global Programme to Eliminate Lymphatic Filariasis to assist Member States in achieving this goal by 2020. The global programme includes 2 main components:

• interrupting transmission of the parasite that causes lymphatic filariasis by using mass drug administration to deliver annual treatment to all people living in endemic areas who are at risk of the disease; and
• managing morbidity and preventing disability among people who have already been affected by the diseas