Mystery disease blinding children in Amazon

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Mystery disease blinding children in Amazon

Wednesday, February 15, 2006; Posted: 12:45 p.m. EST (17:45 GMT)

SAO PAULO, Brazil (Reuters) -- Researchers are scrambling to discover what

is blinding children in the Amazon city of Araguatins in the remote northern

Brazilian state of Tocantins, health officials said Wednesday.

Three of the 365 children identified by the Disease Control Agency of

Tocantins with similar lesions on their eyes are totally blind. Two others were

blinded in one eye and have undergone surgery.

The agency reported the first 17 cases in November.

Since then, state and federal health officials, epidemiologists from the

University of Sao o and the Osvaldo Cruz Foundation in Rio de Janeiro and

specialists from Rio Grande do Sul and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and

Prevention have been compiling data to identify the cause of the disease.

" At this point we are ruling out nothing, " Perciliana Bezerra, coordinator

for the Disease Control Agency in Tocantins, told Reuters.

" We can say that it is only affecting children in Araguatins and not in the

surrounding areas, and there appears to be a link with something in the

Araguaia River. "

Health officials have issued advisories banning swimming or bathing in the

river around the city.

Bezerra said one likely possibility was a local snail that may be

transmitting a fungus, bacteria, virus or parasite but local vegetation or

animals that

live near or in the river may also be the host or cause of the disease.

Health ministry officials are expected to call a meeting of the specialists

involved in the research to try to reach a consensus on the mystery disease in

early March, Bezerra said.

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