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TMNSA~~ONS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF TROPICAL MEDICINE AND HYGIENE (1991) 85, 272-273 1

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The UNESCO initiative to give children an opportunity to derive maximum benefit from the schooling they receive recognizes the fact that poor nutrition and health can severely affect a child’s ability to learn (POLLITT, 1990). It has been suggestedthat intestinal helminth infection may be particularly important becauseinfection results in conditions such as growth stunting and anaemia, which are associatedwith poor academic performance, and becausethe most intense infections with the commonest worms occur in school-age children (HALLORAN et al., 1989). The present study sought to determine whether there was a correlation between academic performance and geohehninth infection in primary school children (aged 9-11 years) in an endemic community in Jamaica. Mandeville is a rural town (population 34 500) in the parish of Manchester in the southern central highlands of Jamaica (altitude 900m). Three schools participated in the study, differing in size and catchment area: school A, the largest (1800 students), was attended mainly by town children; school C, the smallest (500 students), by children largely from the rural outskirts of Mandeville; and school B (1000 students) by children from both areas. Children were ‘streamed’ in the schools according to their academic ability, stream 1 representing those who were judged by their teachers to have the highest academic ability. Stools were collected from 593 children, with the sample distribution shown in the Figure (A). The faecal material was preserved using sodium axide (BUNDYet al., 1985) and examined in duplicate using the Kato thick smear technique. The mean number of eggsper gram of faeces(epg) was determined for each helminth species present. These data yielded estimates of the prevalence and intensity of Trichurk trichiura, Ascaris lumbricoides and Necator americanus infection, for each stream in grades 4 and 5. The overall prevalence of infection was 71*3%, with 67.4% of the children harbouring T. trichiura, 30.5% A. lumbricoides and 6.2% N. americanus. This pattern of infection was similar to that observed for this age group in community studies elsewhere in western Jamaica (SPEED et al., 1987). The result of stratifying overall prevalence by grade

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*Present address: Tropical Metabolism ResearchUnit, University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, Kingston 6, Jamaica.

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Figure. A. Prevalence of geohetith infection (T. rrichiura, A. lusbrieoidcs and N. nmticanus) in school children stratified by grade (4 and 5) and stream (i.e. school-assessedacademicability, decreasing from 1 to 3), for three schools (A, B, C) in Mandeville, Jamaica. Statistical analysis revealed significant differences between streamsin grades 4 and 5 in school A (x2, PCO.05 and co.01 respectively), grade 5 in school B (test on proportion, PcO.01) and in grades 4 and 5 in school C (test on proportion, PCO+Ol and co.05 respectively). The sample size is indicated above each histogram bar. B. Arithmetic mean number of eggs per gram (epgX 10-j) of T. nicAiura in children stratified by grade and stream in the three schools. Statistical analysis on log,, data revealed significant differences between streams of grade 5 in school A (ANOVA, P

Geohelminth infection and academic assessment in Jamaican children.

272 TMNSA~~ONS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF TROPICAL MEDICINE AND HYGIENE (1991) 85, 272-273 1 A 09 9 Geohelminth infection academic assessment childre...
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