Initiative for social action and renewal in eurasia third sector news information bulletin

LOCAL NGO ACTIVITY

Down with Parasites!

By Gamida Gaibova

Director

Association Against Protozoa in People and Animals

One million years ago, dinosaurs inhabited the earth.  Then, despite their great strength, they

disappeared.  There are hundreds of hypotheses about why they disappeared.  Could mankind

endure this same fate?  Protozoa could just have the power to wipe out mankind at some point in

the future.  Protozoa are single-celled organisms, some of which live freely in soil or water.  But

many of them are parasites that must live inside of animals or humans.  Some of them cause

serious diseases such as amebiosis, trichinosis, toxoplasmosis, and malaria.

The problem of parasitic infection has always existed, but veterinary care, modern sanitation,

medical services and properly working communal services and commercial organizations have

meant that in the modern city or town, people have not faced great risk of parasites.

Today this is changing.  In Baku, parasitic infection has the potential to become an epidemic.

Many factors affect the spread of parasites.  Among these factors is high population density in

certain areas, insufficient sanitation services, and inappropriate care of food products.  At the

same time, the natural surroundings in which we live have changed greatly.  Baku used to be a

modern, cosmopolitan city, where it was highly unusual to find cows or sheep; today, however,

such animals can be found not only in the distant outskirts of the city, but also in its squares and

parks.  Many of the natural connections between man and animals have been broken, with

economic conditions leaving dogs and cats living and breeding on the streets—they too can carry

parasites.

The most dangerous places for parasite infection are stores or markets where both animals are

slaughtered and meat is sold.  During the Soviet period, animal slaughter was regulated, limited to

meat-processing factories or special points, and all slaughter was supervised by specialists.

Today, many shops or individuals sell meat which has been slaughtered without supervision.

Dogs and cats eat raw bits of meat or lick the meat juices, thus ingesting parasites.  These

parasites live on in these dogs and cats, and are excreted onto the parks and playgrounds where

Baku’s children play.

People can also ingest these parasites directly, by eating meat that has been slaughtered,

processed, or packaged without proper sanitary supervision.  Eaten rare or uncooked, this meat

can cause parasitic diseases in humans.  With lack of regulation of meat processing today, people

are more and more often becoming host for parasites that formerly lived only in animals.  More

and more often people are falling victim to parasitic diseases.

The Association for the Fight Against Protozoa in Animals and Humans was founded in order to

help prevent the spread of parasites in both animals and humans.  Our Association recently

completed a project to control parasite infection in the Baku area.  This project included

monitoring of several areas in which animals are slaughtered in the city, including the streets of

Baku-Mardyakan, the villages of Bakikhanov and Kishli, and the Yasamalskiy Region Park Zone

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in order to identify those areas with the greatest amount of parasite presence, and to raise public

awareness to the presence of parasites and to the risks that protozoan parasite infection can entail.

The concrete results of the project include a map showing the quantity and type of parasites

identified in the surveyed areas.  Association members talked to butchers in these areas to alert

them to the risks of parasites.  Brochures in both Russian and Azeri were produced for

distribution to people in the areas under study, pointing out the risks of parasite infection,

symptoms of parasitic disease, and how to treat such diseases.

In my opinion, in the future it will be necessary for several NGOs working on medical, social,

and environmental issues to come together to work on this important issue.  Together we will be

able to work to decrease parasite infestation throughout the entire Baku area.  In the future, we

also need to work to ensure that meat byproducts are used or disposed of in a sanitary manner,

and to do more research on the source of infected animals—private plots or large farms.  We plan

to produce flyers, posters, and educational materials for school children about the prevention and

risks of parasite infection.  In just three words, we can state our goal: “down with parasites!”