By Kipkemboi Toroitich
Today marks ten years that the Kenya government has been deworming children between the ages of 2 to 14. The programme is under the National School-Based Deworming Programme (NSBDP), which is a joint action by the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education, with technical support from the global non-profit organization Evidence Action.
The campaign has reached over 6 million children annually across 27 counties.
The major objective of the programme is to control worm infestations to levels that cannot be a threat to public health. The programme resumed in 2021 after a lull in 2020 when Covid-19 disrupted, after running continuously from 2012.
6.4 million children were dewormed across 21 counties in 2021. So far the total number of children treated since 2012 is 52,846,096 million.
“In addition to us allocating funds for deworming, we are also going further to ensure that all the government resources directed towards procuring dewormers go to local manufacturers,” said the Principal Secretary at the Ministry of Health Susan Mochache.
NSBDP’s target for this year is to cover at least 17 counties and 112 sub-counties, targeting 5.7 million children.
The Ministry of Health is procuring a record 5.9 million Albendazole tablets for the treatment. Since 2009, all children in targeted areas, regardless of their enrollment status, have been able to receive treatment for free. The medicines are safe, effective, and recommended by the World Health Organization.
Accurate data and research qualify the programme’s rationale, design, and treatment strategies.
Studies have shown that effective and regular deworming can help reduce school absenteeism by up to 25 percent. It has also shown that deworming school children can improve their cognition and physical development, while increasing Kenya Certificate of Primary Education pass rates among girls.
The Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) closely monitors the NSBDP, tracking its impact on worm prevalence rates across endemic areas.
“Ensuring that no primary school learning is lost because of worm infections remains an urgent challenge that deworming can help solve,” said Chrispin Owaga, Evidence Action Country Director.
In counties where Evidence Action supports deworming, the average cost per child per treatment has been below 50 shillings in the last couple of years, meaning it is cost effective and sustainable.
Over 6 million children in Kenya are at risk of parasitic worm infection. Worm infection inhibits children’s uptake of nutrients and can cause malnutrition, diarrhea, anemia, and compromised immunity.
The impact of deworming on children goes beyond health and education outcomes. A new landmark study published in 2021 by a team of economists, led by Edward Miguel and Nobel laureate Michael Kremer, offers new evidence of the long-term benefits of school-based deworming.
According to the study, which followed a group of Kenyan students every 5 years over a 20-year period, receiving two to three additional years of deworming increased their income by 13% and consumption by 14% decades after treatment.
School-based deworming is widely recognized as the most cost-effective and efficient way to reach at-risk children in countries where school enrollment rates are high and these efforts need to continue to avoid bounce-back to maintain high impact towards elimination efforts.
The NSBDP is already benefiting from local procurement of deworming medicines at the cost of about 70 million shillings annually.
The treatment strategy for the next five years will be informed by parasitological impact surveys currently underway, which will reflect the latest prevalence rates across the country. These will be used to update the treatment strategy and geographical distributions in accordance with WHO guidelines.
