Trachoma, an Old Eye Infection - Essay Example

Trachoma is an extremely old eye infection that has been very commonly known to all of mankind. Its major cause is basically Chlamydia trachomatis which is a microorganism that spreads through any contact with discharges from the eye of the person who has been infected and commonly spread by either fingers when they rub fingers, towels, handkerchiefs, etc. another common method for this disease to spread is via transmission of the infection by eye-seeking flies. This disease is quite severe in nature and after a long time of repeatedly getting infected, the inner part of the eyelid can become so scarred in such a severe fashion that the whole eyelid could actually turn inwards and cause the lashes to rub on the eyeball which results in the scarring of the front part of the eye- the cornea. If this infection is not treated repeatedly and timely, this infection can even lead to the development of an irreversible corneal opacities and eventually even blindness. Trachoma is a rather common infection affecting a total of about 21.4 million people all over the world out of which some 2.2 million have become visually impaired and some 1.2 million are completely blind. The severity of this disease is clear from the fact that it was considered an epidemic and not only any infection outbreak. Trachoma is presently responsible for an overly large 3% of the total world’s blindness. This number however keeps varying because of socio-economic development effects and several different control programmes put in place for curbing the threat of this disease. In spite of several measures being placed, trachoma still widely carry its status of an hyper endemic in several of the extremely poor and very remote and poor rural areas in the continent of Asia, Africa, Australia, Central and South America and the Middle East. The patterns of active trachoma emerge majorly during the early adulthood and during middle-ages. In hyper endemic areas, trachoma is most common in children who ate attending preschool and the rates of prevalence of trachoma are as high as 60-90%. It like most diseased has the potential to majorly affect the most vulnerable members of the society and has a severe affect on children and women. Surprisingly, adult women as compared to men are at a huger risk of being affected by the complication that results in trachoma leading to eventual blindness. The major reason for this trend is that perhaps women spend greater amount of time with young children who are considered the major source of this heinous infection. According to a research recently published in 2013 by Hu VH, Holland MJ, Burton MJ called the Trachoma: Protective and Pathogenic Ocular Immune Responses to Chlamydia trachomatis, the article deals with new research methods for dealing and curbing with trachoma[ CITATION HuV13 \l 1033 ].the article talks about how trachoma is caused by Chlamydia trachomatis (Ct) and is the foremost infectious disease that causes blindness all over the world. Chronic conjunctival inflammation basically develops early on in the childhood and often leads to severe eyelid scarring and then often eventual blindness that comes on as these children grow into adults. The major problem is that the immunal response to Chlamydia trachomatis (Ct) offers only a very limited protection against potential Chlamydia trachomatis (Ct) re-infection, which is more often than not a frequently recurring infection. What is more is that this immunal response is the most important part for the development of any scarring pathology, which leads to eventually the loss of vision and sight. The author in the articles review the latest and most current literature that is available on both the subjects of protective as well as pathological immune responses that exist in trachoma. The resolution of Chlamydia trachomatis (Ct) infection in many animal models has been seen to have been IFNγ-dependent, and involving the Th1 cells. However it still remains to be seen whether this approach will be the case for human ocular infection and this methodology for human purposes still remain to be confirmed. According to the research article, an increasing number of studies that have been conducted over the span of time indicate towards the fact that innate immune responses that arise from the epithelium and some other innate immune cells, as well as the changes that occur in matrix metalloproteinase activity, are extremely important and crucial for the increase in tissue damage and scarring caused by Chlamydia trachomatis (Ct). The current and recent measures for the control of are all majorly centered on the repetitive and constant antibiotic treatment of mass populations which are extremely challenging from the logistical point of view and also have the potential to drive antimicrobial resistance. A vaccine for trachoma would offer significantly large advantages and will be probably extremely beneficial. However, the limited understanding about the mechanisms and procedures involving both the protective immunity and immunopathology for Chlamydia trachomatis (Ct) remain huge hindrances to the process of vaccine development. Vaccine development seems to be the logical option to curb this menace but it still needs to be seen if effective vaccination can be developed keeping in mind all the progressions that involve curing by Chlamydia trachomatis (Ct). The media article ‘Curable eye disease still rife among Indigenous Australians’ published on 15th of march, 2013, it is clearly stated that Australia is perhaps the only country in the developed category that has still not been able to effectively deal with the problem of trachoma despite knowing the fact how potentially dangerous this disease is and that it can lead to eventual blindness. The article talks about how this disease is still prevalent in the indigenous communities in Australia. The article talks about how the numbers of this disease has decreased in the last 4 years during the tenure of the current government but how more work is required to deal with the problem. Basically it’s a matter of funds and their inadequacy that form the major barrier to dealing with this problem. Trachoma for some unknown reason does not tick all the major boxes when it comes to diseases that governments want to focus on eradicating like kidney failure or diabetes. This is unfortunate because trachoma is one of the problems that could have been easily dealt with had there been proper government support behind this cause. The article talks about how medical and surgical measures are important to deal and eradicate trachoma but importance need to be given to smaller and way simpler methods like hygiene, clean hands and faces and just how much simple health awareness can go to deal with a problem whose only solution at times is deemed to be extremely medical or in the least technical. The research article talks about how vaccination is the way to deal with trachoma on the mass level and that simple antibiotic administrations to the mass population does not well. The article takes a completely different approach in the sense that it places importance on scientific discoveries and ways of dealing with the problem but focuses on smaller things that need to be taken care of before moving on to bigger and complicated ways of dealing with the problems[ CITATION Tay13 \l 1033 ]. Bibliography CITATION HuV13 \l 1033 : , (Hu, et al., 2013), CITATION Tay13 \l 1033 : , (Taylor, 2013), Read More