Simple and cheap test emerges for tragic eye disease

0 Comments | AFP, May, 2006

PARIS (AFP) — Scientists say they have invented the first cheap, simple and accurate test for trachoma, the eye disease that ravages parts of Africa.

Nearly six million people have been blinded by trachoma, which is caused by a bacterium called Chlamydia trachomatis. Infection causes the eyelid to fold inward and make the lashes scrape across the cornea and damage it.

In research published online Friday by The Lancet, University of Cambridge scientists report they devised and successfully tested a dipstick test that in less than half an hour can say whether someone is infected with the germ.

The test can be used by local health workers who need only an hour of training and a makeshift room or even a hut, rather than a lab, to carry it out, they say.

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