In Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries, the number of cases of dog-mediated human rabies is at its lowest since the onset of the Regional Program for Rabies Elimination in 1983, a commitment from LAC countries to eliminate dog-mediated rabies coordinated by the Pan American Health Organization. Despite minor setbacks, the decline in the number of human cases has been constant since 198...

BACKGROUND Podoconiosis is one of the major causes of lymphoedema in the tropics. Nonetheless, currently there are no endemicity classifications or elimination targets to monitor the effects of interventions. This study aimed at establishing case definitions and indicators that can be used to assess endemicity, elimination and clinical outcomes of podoconiosis. METHODS This paper describes th...

Progress towards elimination of blinding trachoma Ten years after the Community Eye Health Journal first devoted an entire issue to trachoma (Vol. 7, Issue 14), and five years since its last trachoma-focused edition (Vol. 12, Issue 32), this debilitating disease continues to remain the world’s leading cause of infectious blindness. The good news is that its elimination is now closer in sight du...

This article explores the question of how malaria “ends” in Myanmar, since has been categorized both as an epidemic and being endemic on seemingly countless occasions. The example reveals some limitations understanding a disease within single category experience, such “epidemic.” In case malaria, is shifting term that best understood point at which health authorities decide to intervene disease...

During the endgame of elimination programs, parasite populations may exhibit dynamical phenomena not typical of endemic disease. Particularly, monitoring programs for tracking infection prevalence may be hampered by overall rarity, the sporadic and unpredictable timing and location of outbreaks, and under-reporting. A particularly important problem for monitoring is determining the distance tha...