After many years of intervention, the Ministry of Health (MoH) Uganda and the Carter Centre, an International NGO have revealed that Bushenyi and Mitooma districts are now free from river blindness.

This is after it was revealed that, the two districts out of the 48 that still had people suffering from river blindness have had zero infections since 2015. Uganda is a head of all countries in wiping out the infection.

According to Irene Namuyimba, the Spokesperson of Carter Centre, it’s only the Sudan and DRC border districts still battling with river blindness because of porous borders.

“It’s only remaining in districts bordering Sudan and Congo and this is mainly because of the high levels of insecurity in those areas,” Namuyimba said.

She added that, the Carter Centre promises to keep supporting the MoH until the infection is totally wiped out of Uganda.

“We started this war in 1991 and we shall end it together. As Carter Centre, we are committed to support Uganda until this infection is wiped out,” Namuyimba noted.

“We managed to eradicate this infection through massive treatment of the locals where we vaccinated them door to door and also mobilized and educated our communities on this disease,” Dr. Edward Mwesigye, the District Health Officer of Bushenyi District said.

He also added that, with the help of Village Health Teams (VHTs), they managed to get to the source of the parasite, poured chemicals that killed the flies that were breading in the rivers.

River blindness is caused by a parasite which is transmitted by bites from female infected black flies that breads in fast flowing rivers.