We invite you to read 2024 media highlights for the Guinea Worm Eradication Program below. Some links below may require a login to read the full article.
Leadership Nigeria
Carter Center country representative in Nigeria, Dr. Emmanuel Miri, says former Nigerian Head of State Gen. Yakubu Gowon’s exceptional leadership helped bring about the successful elimination of Guinea worm and other neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) in Nigeria. Dr. Miri stated this in an interview to mark Gen. Gowon’s 90th birthday anniversary in Jos. Learn more »
Emory Health Digest
Nearly four decades ago, former President and University Distinguished Professor Jimmy Carter set out to eliminate Guinea worm disease from the globe. He has very nearly succeeded. Learn more »
The Times of London
The former president celebrates his century and his friends hope he could live to see human cases of the painful parasite eradicated. They still call it the Guinea worm ceasefire. In 1995, the Sudanese civil war had been raging for 12 years. The south was fighting to secede. The north was fighting to prevent them. More than a million people had died. Learn more »
American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene’s E-news Blast.
A new supplement is now available online, A Legacy of Impact in Global Health: Tribute to President Jimmy Carter and Mrs. Rosalynn Carter. Topics cover a wide range of current Carter Center health programming — Guinea worm disease, mental health, river blindness, trachoma, lymphatic filariasis, schistosomiasis, and the Hispaniola Initiative to eliminate malaria and lymphatic filariasis from Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
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World Health Organization
N’Djamena, Chad. 16 – 17 September 2024. The purpose of the meeting is to strengthen commitment of endemic countries as well as of national and international institutions towards eradication of dracunculiasis, through enhanced country ownership and resource mobilization.
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Published by White House History Quarterly.
President Carter’s post-presidency leadership has been instrumental in raising awareness, mobilizing resources, and ensuring support for the distribution of pipe filters in endemic communities. His numerous successes have garnered praise from other former presidents, including President George W. Bush, as highlighted in a 2001 personal letter from the National Archives collection. Learn more »
USA TODAY
Fans of President Jimmy Carter say one of his lifetime goals is coming close to fruition. The 99-year-old, who has been in hospice care for more than a year, rallied during his vibrant post-presidential career to eradicate Guinea worm disease worldwide.
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Community-based efforts have reduced the parasitic infection to a handful of cases in humans each year, but the emergence of infections in dogs and other animals threatens to derail progress. Learn more »
Deadline
Buffalo 8 has acquired worldwide rights out of Cannes to 'The President and the Dragon,' a Jimmy Carter documentary from Sudanese writer, director and producer Waleed Eltayeb and Irish director-cinematographer Ian D. Murphy. Learn more »
TIME named Jimmy Carter to the inaugural 2024 TIME100 Health, a new annual list of 100 individuals who most influenced global health this year. In 1986, when the Carter Center launched its Guinea worm eradication program, the parasitic disease—which creates agonizing lesions on the skin from worms that are ingested as larvae in contaminated water and grow up to a meter in length inside the human body—was endemic in 21 countries, striking 3.5 million people per year.
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In 2015, millions of people around the world tuned in to hear President Jimmy Carter announce that his cancer – metastatic melanoma – had spread to his brain, but he didn’t focus solely on his own disease. Rather, he used the international attention to talk about an illness he did not have.
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A year since The Carter Center announced that former U.S. President Jimmy Carter was receiving end-of-life hospice care, Carter continues to defy the odds. Learn more »
Dracunculiasis, or guinea-worm disease, is on the verge of eradication. The Carter Center says only 13 provisional human cases of the disease were reported worldwide in 2023. Learn more »
The Lancet Infectious Diseases
The Carter Center's 2023 report showed a remarkable reduction in Guinea worm cases, bringing the ancient parasitic disease closer to being eradicated. Alix Boisson-Walsh reports. Learn more »
Guinea worm once infected 3.5 million people every year. Thanks to heroes like Makoy, that number dropped to 13 last year. Learn more »
Guinea worm could soon be the second human disease to be eradicated. In the 1980s millions of cases were recorded annually in 21 countries in Africa and Asia. Now, thanks to huge efforts globally, only 13 reported cases remain. That’s according to The Carter Center - which is leading the international campaign to eradicate the disease. Learn more »
The Times of London
A campaign started by the former US president is close to wiping out a human disease for only the second time in history. Learn more »
Guinea worm disease remains on the cusp of being eradicated, with the global number of cases in 2023 holding steady at 13, according to a provisional account released by The Carter Center.
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The Associated Press
Guinea worm disease remains on the cusp of being eradicated, with the global number of cases in 2023 holding steady at 13, according to a provisional account released by The Carter Center. Learn more »
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