Schistosoma mansoni in pregnancy and associations with anaemia in northwest Tanzania.
Ajanga, Antony;
Lwambo, Nicholas JS;
Blair, Lynsey;
Nyandindi, Ursuline;
Fenwick, Alan;
Brooker, Simon;
(2006)
Schistosoma mansoni in pregnancy and associations with anaemia in northwest Tanzania.
Transactions of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, 100 (1).
pp. 59-63.
ISSN 0035-9203
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trstmh.2005.06.024
Permanent Identifier
Use this Digital Object Identifier when citing or linking to this resource.
Schistosomiasis among pregnant women has been inadequately investigated. In order to determine the importance of Schistosoma mansoni in this subgroup, we conducted a cross-sectional survey of 972 women in Tanzania and investigated the prevalence of Schistosoma mansoni, hookworm and malaria and their associations with anaemia. Overall, 63.5% of women were infected with S. mansoni, with prevalence highest among younger women and decreasing with increasing age. The prevalence of hookworm was 56.3%, and 16.4% of women had malaria parasitaemia. Overall, 66.4% of women were anaemic. Increased risk of anaemia was associated with heavy infection with S. mansoni but not hookworm or Plasmodium falciparum parasitaemia.