Thirteen-year-old Adama being measured by Mectizan® distributer Hiernoh.

Protected in Guinea

"I take Mectizan® because my health is important to me," says 13-year-old Nemnen Adama Bah, as she's measured to determine her annual dose of the drug which prevents river blindness. "The tablets make sure I don't go blind. My family all take it too."

Adama is pictured above with  Hiernoh Sow, the Mectizan® distributer for her village, Hore Fello, in Guinea in West Africa. The stick he uses is a common technique to measure people's height: "I use the measuring stick to check how many tablets each person needs," he explains. "Everything is marked on the stick. For one circle I give one tablet, for two circles I give two tablets and so on."

Going from strength to strength

Sightsavers has worked in Guinea since 1993, when a pilot river blindness project was launched in the Prefecture of Mamou, the region where Hore Fello is located. The success of the project has seen it grow and extend to other infected areas. It now protects around a million people a year from river blindness.

Hore Fello is a small farming community where people grow crops such as sweet potato, groundnut, peanuts and mangoes. There is a local market every Thursday where villagers bring goods to sell, ranging from cloth to fresh produce and livestock. It's via this market that most people find out when the Mectizan® distribution is taking place: announcements are made which vendors and customers then take back to their communities.

Hiernoh has distributed Mectizan® for four years. "I do this role for the love of this community and my village," he says. "When I first started the job lots of local children were afraid - they didn't understand why I carried a big stick and they thought I might hurt them with it or use it for magic! But happily now, when people see my stick, they recognize it and know why I'm here. They're pleased to see me and always welcome me."

A tough job

However he describes the most important piece of equipment as his feet! "I walk to all the different villages and often out into the fields to reach people," he says. "The difficulty is getting to the communities when the villages are far away. I find people that are at home, but if they have had to travel far away to find work I may miss them. The only place with safe and potable water is this village so sometimes I have to take water from here to villages that are 15km away."