Archive for category: Health

Information and stories on health topics.

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Africa Almost Polio-Free

polio_free
In 1988, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative was created. It became the largest public-private public health partnership. Those working on the project include the World Health Initiative (WHO), Rotary International, national governments, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, UNICEF and many others. So far, the program has seen a 99% reduction in the cases of polio. Over 3 billion children have been vaccinated by millions of volunteers.

Now, only three countries remain polio-endemic: Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan. In 2013, only 416 cases were reported.

Most of Africa has been free of polio for years; however, Nigeria has been a trouble spot for the past 20 years. Actually, the leaders and people were very much against vaccinating children. The health organizations had little support, which meant that they lacked the necessary supervision and field staff. At times, the vaccinators were even killed. Currently, the political instability of Northern Nigeria makes monitoring and vaccinating children rather difficult. There could also be cases unreported.

Thankfully, the issues that held people back from vaccinating their children in the past have been solved for the most part. However, in the meantime, many other countries in Africa that were declared polio-free saw outbreaks of polio that were linked directly from Nigeria.

Nigeria saw what will hopefully become the last case of polio back in July of 2014. There have been no cases reported since then. If Nigeria can go a full year without another child contracting polio, then the WHO will remove Nigeria from the list of polio-endemic countries.

While Africa is steps away from being declared polio-free, vaccinating will not end there. As long as Pakistan and Afghanistan continue to report cases, mass global vaccinations will continue to take place to ensure that every child is safe.

– Katherine Hewitt

Sources: NPR, WHO
Photo: Flickr

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Fighting Ebola with Liberty and Justice

Fighting_Ebola
When the Ebola virus attacks the human body, the symptoms include muscle pain, vomit, fever and unexplained hemorrhage. While these symptoms are tragic and often fatal, there are no surprises when it comes to the virus itself—we know what it looks like and we can visibly see the damage it leaves in its wake. When the Ebola virus attacks an economy, however, as it did in Liberia in 2014, we know little about the exact symptoms and even less about the treatments available to combat it.

Until 2014, Chid Liberty, the founder of fair trade clothing manufacturer Liberty and Justice, had run his operations out of his native Liberia with ease. This changed almost overnight with the Ebola outbreaks of 2014.

“We had built the company up to a 500,000 orders per month and in a flash we were out of business,” Liberty said in an interview with Madame Noir. “The Ebola epidemic left us and the hundreds of workers and families that were depending on us stranded without income.”

Our economies are just as vulnerable as our immune systems, and can succumb to Ebola just as easily. It is estimated by the World Bank Group that nearly 50 percent of working adults in Liberia lost their jobs after the outbreak. However, Liberty refused to close his doors at the behest of the disease. Instead he turned his ingenuity into a tonic for the symptoms of Ebola and founded UNIFORM, a company based in Liberia dedicated to making affordable school uniforms for children who had been forced to leave school due to Ebola.

Liberia already has one of the lowest rates of primary education enrollment rates in Africa. According to The Global Economy website, an average of only 53.85 percent children reported having completed primary school between 1978 and 2011.

School attendance often incurs costs far beyond those of just tuition—the prices of books, the inability to work a salaried job, and even the cost of the mandatory uniform act as considerable deterrents to struggling families. The uniforms especially act as barriers to school attendance. Abdul Latif Jameel confirmed this in his 2009 study in Kenya, in which he discovered that providing children with free uniforms reduced school absenteeism by 44 percent and decreased dropout rates (particularly among girls) by a third.

Liberty’s UNIFORM brand has embraced the challenge of mollifying the effects of Ebola on the education of Liberia’s children. Their kick starter campaign, which has $174,760, has already given away 7,000 new school uniforms, all of which are being manufactured by small factories throughout Liberia (Madame Noir).

“I am very proud to be working on such a project,” said Ms. Annie Blamo to the UN Ebola Response team. Blamo is a worker in the Monrovian Liberty and Justice factory who has been manufacturing uniforms for the N.V. Massaquoi school, Blamo’s eight-hour days paid off when her son returned to school in early May. “We are so happy for what this factory has done for the children at the N.V. Massaquoi school and their name will be forever remembered.”

UNIFORM’s kick starter campaign will continue to accept donations until July 16, 2015.

– Emma Betuel

Sources: Ebola Response, Madame Noire, Poverty Action Lab, Time Dotcom
Photo: New York Post

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David Bowie and Iman’s Philanthropic Activities

David-Bowie-and-Iman-Philanthropy
Having been married for two decades, supermodel Iman and heavy-rocker David Bowie have walked a consistent pathway in relieving several communities of hardships pertaining to third-world threats such as the harrowing HIV/AIDS threat.

In late 1990, the dynamic pair participated in a fundraising event, 7th on Sale, for the enhanced medical research in treating and curing AIDS. The pair would go on to serve as recurring donors and participants in foundations that conducted deep, thorough studies of the then-unknown sexual catastrophe throughout the remainder of the 90’s.

But even with impactful collaboration in donor work as a married couple, the pair has never ceased in aiding disadvantaging areas on a separate, individual basis.

In 1998, Iman partnered with fellow philanthropist Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliott in a charitable cosmetic line, Misdemeanor Lipstick, where proceeds collected from each item sold were issued to the nonprofit Break the Cycle, an organization that works to minimize domestic hardships and abuse to help young children and teenagers to live safely.

Around this time, other philanthropic measures taken by the supermodel included her support for organizations alleviating the mistreatment against Somali native women, world hunger and HIV/AIDS-related crises. A majority of Iman’s charitable endorsements were further supported through her organization IMAN Cosmetics, which supports the “Raise Hope for Congo Campaign,” an initiative aimed at protecting and empowering Congolese women and girls.

With his spouse generating similar awareness, David Bowie has headlined global concert tours that assist in the betterment of drastic illnesses that take a toll on developing nations. Along with his famous contributions was his feature in the 1985 Live Aid concert, which generated funds to minimize threats of climatic and AIDS-related dangers.

Moreover, Bowie went on to utilize his live performing skills through another charitable opportunity, this time in loose hand-in-hand with wife Iman. In 2006, the groundbreaking rock musician collaborated with Grammy-winning R&B musician Alicia Keys. The two artists sung and performed live at a New York concert as part of Keys’ nonprofit Keep a Child Alive, an organization that works to rid African children of AIDS and poverty-induced restraints.

Iman was also involved in the lively event, as she and comedian Wanda Sykes served as hosts of the event’s black-tie dinner in celebration of the initiative’s planning and success.

It would not be long until Keys and fellow organizers appointed Iman as the initiative’s Global Ambassador for Keep a Child Alive after noting the model’s sincere elements in raising awareness for multiple pandemics across the globe. With a newly designated role, Iman launched not only additional fundraisers to support a variety of causes but also programs like “I am African,” a tool utilized to build awareness of the AIDS pandemic greatly affecting her native Somalian homeland.

As years have progressed, nothing has stopped this power couple’s path to giving back to those in need. With social media tools redefining the nature of networking for a passionate cause, Iman and David Bowie still remain fixated and up-to-date on endorsing as many foundations as they possibly can to improve the world.

– Jeff Varner

Sources: Philly.com, Billboard, CNN, Slice, Iman Cosmetics, Getty Images
Photo: ENCA

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Deworming School-Age Children

deworming_school_age_children

The World Health Organization estimates that 1.5 billion people, 24% of the world’s population, have a worm infection. Infected people usually have soil-transmitted helminth infections caused by the most prevalent worm species: roundworms, whipworms and hookworms.

These worms are spread through direct contact with contaminated soil caused by open defecation in impoverished, usually tropical, regions. The contact with human feces is a result of poor sanitation, feces contaminating crops and children walking barefoot.

The worm’s eggs can be ingested on food that has not been properly washed or cooked as well as through the consumption of food when people eat with dirty hands. Some worm larvae are also able to work their way through a person’s skin to enter into the body, especially through the soles of children’s bare feet.

When a child has a worm infection, his or her health is compromised. Symptoms are not always pronounced, but rather show up slowly and can sometimes be hard to detect. The worms leech essential nutrients away from a child’s body causing malnutrition, anemia, lethargy and cognitive repression due to lack of nutrients. These issues can cause children to be so physically weakened that school is missed and absenteeism rises.

Thankfully, even though worms are one of the most prevalent infections in poverty stricken areas, it is also has one of the easiest and most cost-effective forms of treatment. Several organizations are working toward deworming children. Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) and Deworm the World Initiative are two that have teamed up in this effort. Together they were able to deworm over 35 million children in 2012!

Deworming school-age children was possible through school initiatives. They have found that deworming children at school with a pill is highly effective for two reasons.

1. It is so easy that teachers can be trained to administer the medicine, which relieves the costs of needing medical specialists on site.

2. The medicine is safe even if a child is not currently infected. If 20% of the children in a region are known to have worms, then every child can be dewormed safely without the possibility of side effects. This will reduce any possible infections.

The medicine cost is very low as well. The actual medicine only costs a few pennies per child; factoring in all the costs associated with administering the medicine, the cost is still less than 50 cents per child. To be the most effective, the medicine needs to be administered twice a year. Since costs are so low, that goal is financially feasible.

A trial conducted in the early 2000s in Kenya found that by administering the medicine, school absenteeism fell by 25% and younger children were found to have cognitive gains. A separate study found that through deworming children’s bodies were better able to fight off other diseases, such as malaria, because essential nutrients were not being depleted by the worms.

Currently, Deworm the World is working quite intensely in India’s Bihar State, Delhi State and Rajasthan State, as well as in Kenya. The organization is able to work through the schools in those areas, treating millions of children. Those children are now given a much greater chance to excel in school since worms are not stealing their body’s resources.

Deworming children cannot be the sole answer, since the source of the worms needs to be addressed in the regions as well. Proper sanitation, clean water, uncontaminated food and children wearing shoes are still needed to ensure new worm infections do not occur.

But while those issues are being worked on, deworming children is giving infected children a chance to thrive in their education, since they are more energetic and focused during their studies and missing much less school than before.

– Megan Ivy

Sources: CDC, Evidence Action, Innovations for Poverty Action, WHO
Photo: What Gives

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Causes of Child Mortality in Developing Countries

child_mortality
According to the World Health Organization, 9.2 million children under the age of 5 die every year, many from preventable conditions that could be treated with simple healthcare interventions. The majority of these deaths occur in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, where the child mortality rate is 175 per 1000 (compared to 6 per 1000 in industrialized countries).

Many of the diseases that kill children younger than 5-years-old are caused by lack of access to healthcare facilities, improper hygiene and sanitation, unclean water and not enough food, and low levels of education and information. The top three causes of child mortality are:

1. Pneumonia
About 15 percent of child mortality deaths are caused by pneumonia. In 2013, pneumonia killed an estimated 935,000 children under the age of 5. Pneumonia occurs when the air sacs in the lungs, the alveoli, are filled with pus and fluid. This makes breathing difficult, and does not allow the infected person to intake enough oxygen. Those who are malnourished have weaker immune systems and are therefore at a higher risk of dying from pneumonia. Pneumonia is also more likely to affect those who have pre-existing illnesses such as HIV, who live in an area where levels of indoor air pollution are high because of cooking with biomass fuels like wood or dung, who live in crowded homes, or those who have parents who smoke. While pneumonia can be treated with antibiotics, only one third of the children infected with pneumonia get the antibiotics necessary to cure them.

2. Diarrhoeal Disease
Each year, diarrhea kills 760,000 children under the age of 5. It is caused by unclean drinking water, contaminated food or person-to-person contact and poor hygiene. Malnourished children are more susceptible to diarrhea, and children in developing countries are likely to contract at least three cases of diarrhea each year. Since diarrhea leads to malnourishment, those who are already weakened by the disease are likely to contract it again. Diarrhea then leads to severe dehydration, which leads to death. It can be treated with rehydration zinc supplements. A good method of preventing diarrhea is decreasing levels of malnutrition, therefore making children less likely to be infected with the disease.

3. Malaria
In Africa, a child dies every minute from malaria, a disease caused by parasites. These parasites are transmitted to people from mosquito bites. The symptoms are first expressed as fever, chills and vomiting, and can then progress to severe illness and death if not treated within 24 hours. Malaria is preventable through the use of mosquito nets and levels of deaths caused by malaria are decreasing. Malaria related mortality cases in Africa have fallen 54 percent since 2000.

Child mortality is also high in countries that have a high Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR). More than a third of child mortality deaths occur in the first month of life and are related to pre-term birth, birth asphyxia (suffocation), and infections. In order to reduce Child Mortality, Maternal Mortality rates also have to decrease. This can happen with increased access to healthcare facilities and increased prenatal visits.

Child mortality rates are decreasing, but there is still work to be done. Vaccinations, adequate nutrition and increasing education will all help to decrease the levels of child mortality.

– Ashrita Rau

Sources: WHO 1, WHO 2, WHO 3, WHO 4
Photo: Flickr

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Addiction and Poverty Connected

Addiction and Poverty
It is common knowledge that poverty and substance abuse tend to exist in tandem. The direction of causation is unclear, but the link between addiction and poverty is certainly to be considered.

A study by the National Bureau for Economic Research studied the relationship between poverty and drug abuse, specifically marijuana and cocaine. The study found that there was a positive relationship between poverty and substance abuse, even when controlling for various familial factors—implying that substance abuse may even be a casual factor of poverty. A limitation of the study was that it could not account for the drug usage of the homeless and others, which further strengthened the case that drug usage may be a causal factor of poverty.

And yet, it still isn’t that simple. The study had other limitations. The drug usage was self-reported, the population studied was highly biased (mostly poor already), and assumptions on preferences and educational effects (among others) could not be proved. Nonetheless, it seems that there is a definitive relationship between drugs and poverty, and perhaps even some causal effect.

 

Poverty and Addition: Directly or Inversely Related?

 

But could the causal effect also run the other way? Quite possibly. A study from Duke University found that economically stressed children later in life experienced higher rates of tobacco usage (but not binge drinking or marijuana). The researchers attributed this effect to poverty’s impact on self-control. Although the study did not find increases in marijuana usage or other drugs, the causal chain between poverty and eventual drug usage was established.

Although evidence seems to suggest that, to some degree, drug usage can “cause” poverty, extending this logic to an extreme would be absurd. Substance abuse is not the sole driving force behind the worldwide phenomena of poverty; people born into poverty cannot have been driven to poverty by drug usage. There must be more to explain the relationship that clearly exists.

Another research paper suggests that literacy, education, poverty, income equality and unemployment are factors that lead to drug abuse, further complicating the relationship.

Conflicting papers do lead to an obvious but important point. Poverty and addiction are interlinked. Conjoined at the hip, both issues feed off each other and their effects strengthen their respective feedback loops. Poverty leads to mental states which can lead to drug abuse which leads to addiction, which begets crime, which leads to worse employment prospects. A flow diagram to show the effects and directions that these two conditions could lead to would be a huge circular mess, with arrows flying in all directions.

The question then becomes, how does a government fight poverty or substance abuse? Based on existing evidence, perhaps the best answer is that one problem cannot be adequately addressed without also attending to the other.

– Martin Yim

Sources: NBER, Duke Medicine, International Journal of Basic & Applied Sciences
Photo: The Province

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Why Brain Drain Hurts a Developing Nation

Why Does Brain Drain Hurt a Developing Nation

There is a general consensus that developing education is an incredibly important factor to reducing poverty. After an individual receives their education, that person may stay in their home country for a while, but if the economy is too depressed, they may move abroad to work. When this happens, countries are said to have experienced a “brain drain,” or “the migration of health personnel in search of the better standard of living and quality of life, higher salaries, access to advanced technology and more stable political conditions in different places worldwide,” according to the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine.

While brain drain, or human capital flight, usually consists of health personnel, it can also include any person in any highly skilled field.

Brain drain has its benefits for individuals and drawbacks for the developing nation that the individual is leaving. For the worker, leaving for a more developed country has proven to have great benefits. That worker tends to have higher productivity, can usually research and publish more in their field, earn a higher salary, and even send money back to any family in their native home. In short, the individual has used his or her training to move out of a poverty situation and create a better life for their family.

However, for the nation that is left, brain drain results in many gaps in vital industries.

Puerto Rico is suffering from a cycle of poverty that brain drain has helped perpetuate. The migration of skilled workers did not cause the economic problems, yet the problems are more difficult to solve when highly skilled professionals, especially healthcare workers, leave the country.

Haiti has also seen a shortage of workers after having a brain drain: “Healthcare is a contributing factor to brain drain because the pay to healthcare professionals such as doctors and nurses, who are lacking in accessibility, is lower than in other countries. Another contributor to brain drain is education, because the education system is poor—not only do few individuals acquire a post-secondary education, there are few opportunities to advance in specialized fields of interest and conduct meaningful research.

Even more developed countries are seeing the effects of healthcare workers leaving unstable economies. Greece is currently feeling the results of brain drain as more and more healthcare workers are leaving for Germany in the wake of economic unrest. If this continues to spiral, there will be a massive healthcare shortage.

What can be done to stop brain drain? Well, it may never completely stop until economies, schools and healthcare facilities are made better in developing countries. Unless healthcare professionals and other skilled workers are given a financial or educational reason to stay, brain drain will continue to occur.

Some good is being done to stop brain drain in Haiti through the work of the University of the People. They are working to help some students gain education with the hopes that those students will stay in the country and become leaders.

Developing nations need more initiatives like this to help keep skilled workers from leaving.

– Megan Ivy

Sources: Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, New York Times, U.N., University of the People, University of Maryland
Photo: TheAtlantic

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The Debilitating Effects of Schistosomiasis

The Debilitating Effects of Schistosomiasis-TBP
Among neglected tropical diseases, few are harder to pronounce than Schistosomiasis, a parasitic infection spread through fresh water. Fewer still are more deadly. According to the Center for Disease Control, “In terms of impact, this disease is second only to malaria as the most devastating parasitic disease.” Currently, Schistosomiasis infects more than 200 million people worldwide.

Found mostly in Africa and parts of South America and Asia, Schistosomiasis, or bilharzia, is quite an unpleasant disease. It spreads through parasitic blood flukes, also known as schistosomes, which live in certain types of fresh water snails. These schistosomes are tricky creatures and infect their victims with their larvae simply through skin contact in contaminated fresh water.

Once inside the victim’s body, the larval schistosomes mature over the course of several weeks into adult flatworms. These worms then make their way to the victim’s blood vessels where they reach full maturity and mate, producing eggs. The eggs then exit the body through the victim’s urine and stools. From there, the cycle begins again.

Oddly enough, it is not the worms themselves that cause problems but the body’s reaction to the eggs. On their way out of the body, many of the eggs become stuck in the intestine and bladder, which leads to inflammation and scarring of vital organs.

While the short-term symptoms of bilharzia are similar to that of the flu, its long term effects cause much more damage. Chronic bilharzia can cause bladder cancer, infertility and the enlargement of the liver and abdomen. It remains unknown as to how many die annually from the disease but estimates range between 20,000 and 200,000 people.

However, most victims of this neglected tropical disease continue to live for years with it. For chronic sufferers, life becomes increasingly difficult. In fact, the economic consequences of bilharzia rival its health complications. Sufferers often are too debilitated to support themselves and essentially become disabled. It has the greatest impact on children. Youth that suffer from chronic bilharzia experience stunted growth and learning difficulties, which can lead many to drop out of school. Unsurprisingly, due to its economic burden, researchers have linked instances of Schistosomiasis with poverty.

Fortunately, an effective treatment called praziquantel can rid the body of the parasite and cure the disease. Best of all, it is cheap. One treatment of praziquantel costs about 20 to 30 cents and is often available free of charge in some heavily afflicted regions of Sub-Saharan Africa. In 2012, 35 million people were treated for bilharzia with this drug.

With such a cheap and effective drug, the primary strategy of the World Health Organization (WHO) is that of mass treatment without even an individual diagnosis. These mass treatments focus on vulnerable communities like those that live and work near fresh water sources and also school children. In some areas with lower levels of transmission, many officials believe that they can eradicate this disease.

Other methods of prevention involve stopping bilharzia at its source: its freshwater snail hosts. Some efforts have aimed to focus on killing the host snails by using chemical treatments on fresh water sources. However, this has negative effects on surrounding animals and also must be continued to prevent snails from returning. Beyond medicine, the best form of prevention is simply adequate hygiene and sanitation.

While the victims of bilharzia have begun to receive more treatment, a large amount of work still remains. According to a recent WHO epidemiological record, about 40 million people received treatment for Schistosomiasis, which represents only 12.7% of the population requiring preventative treatment measures for Schistosomiasis globally. With medicine so effective, it is tragic that so many should go untreated.

– Andrew Logan

Sources: CDC, The End Fund, NCBI, WHO 1, WHO 2
Photo: Carter Center

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What is Being Done for Human African Trypanosomiasis

Sleeping-Disease
Human African Trypanosomiasis (HAT), also known as Sleeping Disease, is prevalent in Sub-Saharan Africa, affecting rural, poverty-stricken populations with close to 10,000 new cases each year. There are 2 strands of the disease: East African Trypanosomiasis and West African Trypanosomiasis. Both strands are only spread in rural Africa via the bite of tsetse flies and cause similar symptoms, but the incubation periods and medications used are slightly different.

A tsetse bite infects the patient with a parasite, which then lives in the host’s lymphatic system and blood stream. There is also a chance that a pregnant woman can pass the infection on to her child. HAT can cause headaches, fever, weakness, joint pain, stiffness and irregular sleep patterns in its first stages. When the infection advances and crosses over into the host’s nervous system, psychiatric disorders, seizures, coma and death can occur.

The East African strain, named for the region that it is typically found, is the least common of the two with only a few hundred people becoming infected each year. This strain moves particularly fast, though, as patients see symptoms within 1-3 weeks and, if left untreated, death can occur within a few months. This strain is also a bit harder to control, as it is a zoological disease—several animals are able to host the parasitic strain.

The West African strain is the most common with 7,000-10,000 new cases reported each year. This strain can be hard to detect because symptoms can take up to a few months to surface and death can occur after the patient has been infected for several years. This strain, even with its prevalence, can be easier to contain, as humans are the primary hosts of infection. Effective treatment of infected humans will help stop the spread of the disease.

There are medications to help people combat the disease, but different medications are used depending on the stage of infection. Detection can be difficult and the medicine can be expensive, which makes treatment less accessible to those infected, as they reside primarily in rural areas. Spinal taps must be administered to ensure that the disease has not breached the central nervous system, which would cause the treatment plan to change. Even after a patient is considered cured, he or she must undergo routine screening, including a spinal tap, for up to two years. Even with precautions in place, relapse remains possible.

Even with few infected tsetse flies and a relatively small number of cases, the disease saw a resurgence of new cases after several years of latent activity. Nevertheless, the number of new cases are once again reducing every year; reports to the World Health Organization (WHO) have gone from 300,000 in 1995, down to just over 17,000 in 2004, below 10,000 in 2009 and only 7,139 in 2010.

Unfortunately, there is no vaccine available for HAT and recovery from a case does not result in immunity, yet progress is being made.

The WHO has taken great measures to aid African countries that are considered endemic: “technical assistance, access to diagnosis, training [and] access to treatment.” When these areas are focused on, things improve. Access to treatment has been a priority for the WHO because the medicine used for the second stage of the West African strain is an arsenic derivative. New treatments are being worked on to reduce the need for medicines that are accompanied by detrimental side effects.

Not every tsetse fly carries the disease, but the higher number of bites a person gets increases a person’s chance of becoming infected. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) tells U.S. travelers to wear protective clothing when traveling in rural African areas with lots of brush, wear neutral colors that do not attract the flies, inspect vehicles for flies, avoid bushes, and use insect repellent. Repellent does not guaranteed protection against the tsetse fly, but it will help.

This disease’s resurged because it was ignored for a time. With the CDC’s suggestions and the WHO’s work in the field, the disease could become virtually non-existent in a short time if the decline seen in recent years continues. The medication used will help people gain their lives back and once again become productive members in their society. With all the good work being done to get rid of HAT, this disease could become a thing of the past in rural sub-Saharan communities.

– Megan Ivy

Sources: CDC, WHO, PLOS
Photo: the journal.ie

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Katya Cherukumilli Takes on Poverty in Rural India with Bauxite

Living in poverty often means consuming contaminated drinking water. Assembled by the Blum Center for Global Engagement, Katya Cherukumilli earned recognition in June 2015 at the University of California Irvine’s Designing Solutions for Poverty challenge. She has been addressing and innovating ways to cheaply eradicate fluoride from drinking water by using a remediation solution in groundwater. In doing so, she is helping to protect those without any other source for cleaner water.

Katya Cherukumilli developed a cheap way to use bauxite, a material that produces alumina and aluminum, in order to filter out fluoride in drinking water. She is a PhD student at the University of California, Berkley, set to complete an Environmental Engineering Degree in 2017. Her work with the Gadgil Lab for Energy and Water Research found a cheap solution to the problem concerning fluorosis.

The Gadgil Lab is located at the University of California, Berkley. Its mission is to alleviate poverty using research and engineering studies. Katya Cherukumilli is working specifically with fluoride removal. Having been born near the district of interest, Nalgonda, she feels, according to Alex Chan with Daily Pilot, “This is something that is very close to my heart. Access to clean water does not seem like something people should die for.”

According to Gadgil Lab, drinking excessive levels of fluoride, above 1.5 mg/L, can cause anemia, discolored enamel and bone deformities, also known as skeletal fluorosis. Affected groundwater exists on a global scale in places like Sri Lanka, China, Est African Rift Valley, northern Mexico and Argentina.

With 200 million people drinking toxic water, 66 million in India are at risk. A site is open for examining the water in Telegana, where contamination is the most acute and fixated. Ten percent of this district has been affected and 10,000 are permanently deformed.

Groundwater in the Nalgonda District in India has a toxic amount of fluoride that causes deformities with excess intake. Skeletal fluorosis patients reside here. Granite rocks underground are breaking apart and contaminating drinking water with fluoride.

A toxic level of fluoride in drinking water is a problem that has been known for six decades. When rural areas cannot reach safer alternatives, the problem continues. Responding to this issue takes time and manpower. Areas where innovations are costly, difficult to set up or culturally ineffective make it difficult to introduce defluoridation. Gadgil Lab lists a few requirement guidelines addressing the issues.

Any technology useful to the cause must be local, affordable, and appropriate for the culture. It should require minimal maintenance and must function very successfully in the rural area.

To satisfy these requirements, Cherukumilli has been researching bauxite ore. She found that remediating groundwater fluoride needs to be more cost-effective. Cherukumilli is refining bauxite in order to minimize expenditure per person per year from $50 to $1.

Her method to reduce cost includes improving sustainability, so less material is required. Also less energy and carbon costs are needed to solve the issue.

Forty community leaders, scientists, business partners and investors at the competition agreed her progress in this field of study has absolute potential. It will protect the less fortunate from further disfigurement that affects them socially, economically and medically. Her presentation at the Irvine’s Designing Solutions for Poverty challenge received the popular vote among three others.

– Katie Groe

Sources: GADGIL Lab 1, GADGIL Lab 2, The Orange County Register, The Daily Pilot, GADGIL Lab 3
Photo: Daily Pilot