page_title: Mass deworming
section_title: Background
hierarchical_section_title: Mass deworming / Background
caption_attribution_description: English: picture taken during Global Handwashing Day 2008 activities and the simultaneous launching of the Essential Health Care Package (EHCP) for Philipino Children (includes handwashing, tooth brushing and twice a year deworming). photo provided by Robert Gensch
context_page_description: Mass deworming, also called preventive chemotherapy, is the process of treating large numbers of people, particularly children, for helminthiasis and schistosomiasis in areas with a high prevalence of these conditions. It involves treating everyone – often all children who attend schools, using existing infrastructure to save money – rather than testing first and then only treating selectively. Serious side effects have not been reported when administering the medication to those without worms, and testing for the infection is many times more expensive than treating it. So for the same amount of money, mass deworming can treat more people more cost-effectively than selective deworming. Mass deworming is one example of mass drug administration.
  Mass deworming of children can be carried out by administering mebendazole and albendazole which are two types of anthelmintic drug. The cost of providing one tablet every six to twelve months per child is relatively low.
  Over 870 million children are at risk of parasitic worm infection.
context_section_description: Intestinal parasitic worms (most of them falling in the category of soil-transmitted helminths) affect approximately 1.5 billion people, according to WHO estimates, with 218 million needing preventive treatment for schistosoma-type worms in 2015.
  The World Health Organization recommends mass deworming of children who live in endemic areas, in order to reduce morbidity by reducing the overall worm burden. The WHO advises that worm infections adversely affect nutritional status, impair cognitive processes, and can cause conditions such as intestinal obstruction or lesions in the urinary tract and liver. Periodic drug treatment is expected to bring about health benefits such as reduced micronutrient loss, reduced environmental contamination, improved nutritional status and cognitive function, and better school performance in certain circumstances.
  In 2001, the World Health Assembly set a target for the WHO to treat 75 percent of school-aged children by 2010. In 2014, over 396 million preschool and school-aged children were treated, corresponding to 47 percent of children at risk.
caption: Hand washing and twice annual deworming is part of the Essential Health Care Package in the Philippines ("Fit for School" program)
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