KATHMANDU, Nepal–Despite the fact that 20 percent residents of the capital Kathmandu have been affected by the disease, large numbers of people in the capital are reluctant to take anti-elephantiasis drug. Most of the locals seem to ignore the fact that disease can cause permanent handicap.
Only a small numbers of people turning up to take the medicine in the first day of the campaign against the disease also showed that it is tough task to convince the Kathmanduites to administer medicine against elephantiasis.
Health workers who involved in anti-elephantiasis drive during the campaign went hard time as some locals even released dogs to chase former.
“Locals did not open the gate to health volunteers while some people even released dogs to chase them” heath officials at the District Public Health Office (DPHO) in Kathmandu informed quoting women volunteers as saying.
Not only the locals but many lawmakers of newly formed Constituent Assembly (CA) have turned a deaf ear towards the call of volunteers to take medicines.
Volunteers approaching lawmakers at CA premises to administer anti-elephantiasis capsules to lawmakers returned disappointed as they did not receive a warm welcome from the latter.
When the volunteers approached the CA members, some of them refereed to their colleagues instead while some did not heed the former, it is learnt. To everyone surprise, only eleven CA members in 575 member’s assembly took the capsule!
The government has launched a special vaccination campaign against the disease.
According to the Ministry of Health and Population, people in 61 districts are at high risk of elephantiasis, including three districts in the Kathmandu Valley.
The government has been distributing the anti- elephantiasis drugs with the recommendation of the World Health Organisation since 2003.