Medical Experts To Carry Out Further Research On Nodding Syndrome

A World Health Organization official has described the recently concluded international scientific conference on the mysterious nodding syndrome as a great achievement in the fight against the disease.
  
Dr. Joaquim Saweka, the World Health Organization’s country representative in Uganda, told VOA that the conference held in Kampala aimed at bringing together everyone interested in the study of the disease, in order to gauge what knowledge currently exists, and to identify critical gaps in that knowledge.

“We also agreed to have a common designation,” he said. “It is now nodding syndrome,” unlike in the past, when the disease has gone by different names.

Another achievement of the conference, he said, is the “agreement on a common case definition.” He explained that in the past the elements that led one to declare a diagnosis of nodding syndrome were different from country to country.

The conference also came up with a platform for future research, and a network of people who are interested in research on nodding syndrome.

The conference, which was organized by WHO, drew international and local medical experts in a bid to find new strategies to respond to the disease.

The disease affects only children, and gradually devastates its victims through debilitating seizures, stunted growth, wasted limbs, mental disabilities and sometimes starvation.

So far the disease has claimed the lives of over 200 children in northern Uganda, and has affected many families.

Although the cause of the disease is not known, Dr. Seweka said, “at least we agreed on case management, so it will be a symptomatic treatment, what should be prioritized, and all the other determinants that should be considered during treatment.”

He said there are commonalities in South Sudan, Uganda and Tanzania, where the disease is concentrated among children, such as an   environment infested with a parasite that causes river blindness.

Another common feature, he added, is that most of the children are in the age range of 5 to 15 years, and have some form of nutritional deficiency.

Health experts and researchers from the Center for Disease Control, the UK Department for International Development, UNICEF and global health institutions and universities attended the conference.

They agreed to carry out a comprehensive research study in Uganda, South Sudan and Tanzania to, among other goals, identify the characteristics of the syndrome, and to determine if the disease presents itself with similar symptoms in the three countries.

Surveys Show Tight US Presidential Race

WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. public opinion surveys show a close race for president between the incumbent Democrat, President Barack Obama, and his presumptive Republican opponent, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney. The polls also show voters tend to personally like the president more but give a slight edge to Romney on handling the economy, which is by far the most important issue in the campaign.

The latest Gallup daily tracking poll gives President Obama a narrow 47 to 46 percent lead over Mitt Romney with about 90 days until the election in November. There has been little fluctuation in the Gallup daily tracking poll since April, and analysts say that could mean the race will remain close until Election Day.

“Mr. Obama seems to be slightly ahead nationally and seems to be slightly ahead in more of the swing states than not," says Peter Brown of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. "But it is not a huge lead.”

Brown’s latest polls in three competitive or so-called swing states also show a tight race. Romney holds a five point lead in Colorado, while the president is ahead by four points in Virginia and six points in Wisconsin.  Obama won all three states in 2008 and they are among about a dozen or so battleground states this year, where the presidential campaigns will focus their organizing and advertising activities.

Brown says the race for the White House will intensify shortly with Romney’s expected announcement of a vice presidential running mate and the two party nominating conventions that will be held the last week in August and the first week in September.

“There are several events that will really determine this election -- Mr. Romney’s choice of a running mate and the Republican convention and the Democratic convention and how the two people come across," says Brown. "And then, obviously, the debates will be the crowning events of the campaign.”

Three presidential debates will be held beginning in early October plus one debate between the two vice presidential candidates.

Longtime political analyst Tom DeFrank of the New York Daily News says Mitt Romney will try to use the Republican Party convention to reintroduce himself to American voters.

“I think Romney is going to get a bounce [i.e., a boost in his public opinion ratings] when he announces his vice presidential candidate and he is going to get a bounce from his acceptance speech at the convention," says DeFrank, who appeared on VOA’s Issues in the News program. "And I suspect that Romney will come out of that convention a few points ahead.”

DeFrank also notes that the polls show most voters have already decided which candidate they will support, with a relatively small pool of undecided voters left for the campaigns to try to persuade ahead of November 6.

“The bottom line to me is that President Obama has not convinced the majority of the American people that he deserves to be reelected," he says. "Neither has Governor Romney convinced a majority of the American people that he is up to the job of being president either.”

Both presidential campaigns and their allied fundraising groups, known as super PACs, or political action committees, have spent tens of millions of dollars running attack ads during the past several weeks trying to influence those undecided voters.  And experts say we can expect that to continue into November.