The World Health Organization's (WHO) projects that the treatment for schistocomiasis (bilharzia) will reach 235 million people over the next five years.
This according to the WHO would be achieved by increasing availability of medicines (praziquantel) using gifts of medicines and improved distribution at country level the next five years.
This was contained in a new report, "From Promises to Progress", released in London in advance of the first anniversary of the landmark London Declaration and copied to the Ghana News Agency in Accra on Thursday.
The London Declaration which brought public and private partners together under the shared goal of controlling and eliminating 10 Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) by 2020.
The report on neglected tropical diseases highlights exceptional progress during the past two years of the fight to eliminate tropical diseases by the year 2020.
NTDs are a group of infectious diseases that disproportionally affect the world’s poorest and most vulnerable populations. It is estimated that more than one billion people are affected by NTDs, including roughly 800 million children.
Although these diseases are the most common infections amongst the world’s poorest, they have traditionally received little or inconsistent attention on international the health agenda
The London Declaration was the commitment made by partners including pharmaceutical companies, donors, endemic countries and non-government organizations to contribute their technical knowledge, drugs, research, funding and other resources to treat and prevent NTD among the world’s poorest populations.
The report indicated that global partners in the fight against NTDs had made substantial progress over the past year, with more than 40 countries delivering detailed plans to control and eliminate thee diseases.
It said major pharmaceutical companies had also donated more than one billion treatments to meet 100 percent of drug requests by endemic countries.
For the past one year, there has also been a renewed momentum shifting the world closer to eliminating many of the conditions that take their greatest toll among the poor, "thanks to a new global strategy, a regular supply of quality-assured, cost-effective medicines and support from global partners", it added.
Collaborative efforts among public and private sector organizations have also produced major successes in their work to combat NTDs, a group of diseases that disproportionately affect those living in poverty and sicken, disable and disfigure more than one billion people in 149 countries and territories.
Notable achievements in 2012 according to the report included the world's leading pharmaceutical companies which provided 1.12 billion treatments for NTDs, an increase of 150 million treatments from 2011.
"These commitments fully met the increased requests from endemic country partners and removed a key bottleneck to the successful treatment and prevention of NTDs", it stated.
Twenty-nine countries began receiving albendazole or mebendazole to treat or prevent soil-transmitted helminthiasis, increasing treatments provided with those drugs from 46 million in 2011 to 238 million in 2012.
The United Kingdom increased its spending on NTDs from US$24.7 million in 2011 to $42.5 million in 2012, while the U.S. Agency for International Development has also steadily increased its donations over the past several years, reaching $89 million in 2012.
The donors and others committed funds to support integrated programs, will help scale up and expand existing programs, increase funding available for disease mapping, improve program strategies through research and develop new tools.
More than 40 countries developed multi-year integrated NTD plans, and Brazil, Burundi, Cameroon and Honduras launched their plans. Oman became the first previously endemic country verified as trachoma-free, with more expected later in 2013.
Two NTD diagnostic tests received regulatory approval: the first ever lateral flow test for sleeping sickness was commercially launched in December 2012, and a new rapid diagnostic test for lymphatic filariasis would become commercially available in the first half of 2013.
The report indicated that support from endemic countries and partners ha helped fast-track actions and initiatives which were now having a measurable impact in affected countries and considerable scaling up of preventive chemotherapy.
The intervention involved the widespread delivery of single-dose, quality-assured medicines. In 2010 alone, 711 million people received treatment for at least one of the four diseases targeted for preventive chemotherapy (lymphatic filariasis, onchocerciasis, schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminthiases).
"With this new phase in the control of these diseases, we are moving ahead towards achieving universal health coverage with essential interventions. The challenge now is to strengthen capacity of national disease programmes in endemic countries and streamline supply chains to get the drugs to the people who need them, when they need them," Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of WHO said.
Dr Chan, noted that "The prospects for success have never been so strong, Many millions of people are being freed from the misery and disability that have kept populations mired in poverty for centuries.
Nevertheless, recent progress has revealed unprecedented needs: more control strategies and new technical tools."
The report after defining the concept of elimination and eradication, analyzed some challenges that remained at country level, which included improving coordination and integration of national disease control programmes.
It also focused on an urgent need to strengthen human resources and to work with other sectors such as education, agriculture and veterinary public health in disease control programmes
WHO used the opportunity to launch its second NTD report, "Sustaining the Drive to Overcome the Global Impact of Neglected Tropical Diseases", which discussed the path to achieving 2020 goals, identifying challenges and proposes plans to address each disease. Together, these reports offer a united way forward for the NTD community.
Key highlights of the report included eradication of dracunculiasis are in sight, which reported a reduction in the number of reported cases of dracunculiasis to 521 cases between January and September 2012 compared with 1006 confirmed cases for the same period in 2011 and of human African trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness) to less than 7000 in 2011 from a high of 30 000 annual cases at the turn of the century.
Rabies has been eliminated in several countries, and WHO anticipates regional elimination of this preventable disease by 2020. A new strategy involving the early detection and use of antibiotics to treat Buruli ulcer has drastically reduced suffering and disability from this chronic and debilitating skin condition.
An evaluation of WHO’s new strategy, which aims at eradicating yaws by 2020, using a new oral antibiotic treatment designed to replace those developed in the 1950s and which mainly centered on delivering injections of benzathine benzylpenicillin.
Threats posed by dengue in 2012, dengue ranked as the fastest spreading vector-borne viral disease, with an epidemic potential in the world, registering a 30-fold increase in disease incidence over the past 50 years, "The world needs to change its reactive approach and implement sustainable preventive measures".
To coordinate efforts and monitor progress, partners developed a scorecard to track the London Declaration pledges. Released today with the report, the London Declaration Scorecard captures progress made and where efforts must improve if partners hope to reach the 2020 goals. In addition, the scorecard and report set benchmarks for success in 2013 and beyond that would help put the world on a steady trajectory toward those goals.
Mr Simon Bush, Director of NTDs at Sightsavers International and former Chair of the NTD NGDO Network said "Game-changing success against NTDs can only happen with the collaboration of all sectors: governments, donors, industry and NGOs."
In addition to marking gains against NTDs, "From Promises to Progress" identifies several gaps. Preliminary analyses suggested an annual funding gap of approximately $300 million through 2020 for the implementation of NTD programs, which would prevent the scale-up of critical initiatives and endanger hundreds of millions of people.
Partners will need to strengthen implementation capacity in NTD-endemic countries, including investments in disease mapping, and ramp up research and development for prioritized new tools to detect, treat and prevent the diseases.
To achieve WHO’s 2020 goals, the NTD community must secure the increased resources and political will necessary to initiate and scale up programs to close the remaining gaps. In doing so, together we can move toward a world free of these devastating diseases, the report noted.