SERIOUS ILLNESSES THAT NEED SPECIAL MEDICAL ATTENTION

The diseases covered in this chapter are often difficult o0r impossible to cure without medical assistance.

 NOTE: Many of the illnesses covered in this article may also be serious and requires medical attention. Read SIGNS OF DANGEROUS ILLNESS

MALARIA

TUBERCULOSIS:

Tuberculosis of the lungs is a chronic (long-lasting), contagious (easily spread) disease that anyone can get. But it most often strikes persons between 156 and 35 years of age especially those who are weak, poorly nourished, or lives with someone who has the disease.

Tuberculosis is curable. Yet thousand die needlessly from this disease every year. Both for prevention and cure it is very important to treat tuberculosis early. Therefore, you should know the signs of tuberculosis and be on the lookout for them.

RABIES:

Rabies comes from the bite of a rabid mad animal, usually a rabid dog, cat, fox, wolf, skunk, or jackal. Bats and other animals may also spread rabies.

TETANUS (LOCK JAW):

Tetanus results when a germ that lives in the face of animals or people enters the body through a wound. Deep or dirty wounds are especially dangerous.

MENINGITIS:

This is a very serious infection of the brain, more common in children. It may begin as a complication of another illness, such as measles, mumps, whooping cough, or an ear infection. Children if mothers who have tuberculosis sometimes get tubercular meningitis in the first few months of life.

TYPHOID FEVER:

Typhoid fever is an infection of the gut that affects the whole body. It is spread from feces-to-mouth in contaminated food and water and often comes in epidemics (many people sick at once); of the different infections typhoid is one of the most dangerous.

TYPHUS:

Typhus is an illness similar to but different from typhoid. The infection is transmitted by bites of: Lice, ticks, rat fleas

ONCHROCERCIASIS (RIVER BLINDNESS):

This disease is a kind of filariasis common in many part of Africa.  The infection is caused by tiny worms that are carried from person to person by small, hump backed flies or gnats known as black flies (simulids) which breeds in fast running water. The worms are injected into a person when an infected fly bites him.

TRYPANOSOMIASIS (SLEEPING SICKNESS):

This is a dangerous infection caused and spread by TSE-TSE flies from cows, pigs or other animals. It occurs in rural areas in many parts of Africa, especially around water holes where the flies breed.

HEPATITIS B:

This is more chronic that HEPATITIS A and more severe. It is usually spread when blood from an infected person.