Eliminating Human Schistosomiasis with Village Aquaculture

Elizabeth Huttinger of the Manobi Development Foundation in the U.S. proposes to launch free-range freshwater prawn farming in rivers and canals where the parasitic disease schistosomiasis is endemic among children. Prawns are natural predators of snails, the intermediate host of the parasite, and reintroducing the prawn as part of a biological approach called Integrated Infectious Disease Control can not only interrupt the life cycle of the parasite, but also provide an income- generating activity for village women who can harvest and sell the prawns.