Sleeping sickness is caused by parasites in infected tsetse flies that can be passed to humans through bites or from an infected mother. Symptoms include insomnia, swollen lymph nodes, sweating, and coma. Two types of parasites cause the disease, and treatments depend on the stage of infection.
Sleeping sickness, also called African trypanosomiasis, is a swelling of the brain caused by parasites that live in infected tsetse flies. When a tsetse fly infected with the parasite bites a human, the parasite is passed into the person’s bloodstream. Also, an infected mother can pass the disease to her unborn child. Symptoms include insomnia, swollen lymph nodes, sweating and coma. If left untreated, African trypanosomiasis can lead to death.
Two types of parasites can cause sleeping sickness. One is Trypanosoma brucei rhodiense, or T. brucei rhodiense, which results in a more rapidly developing form of African trypanosomiasis. The second is Trypanosoma brucei gambiense, or T. brucei gambiense.
African trypanosomiasis typically occurs in rural areas that have poor medical facilities. These areas can be near rivers, lakes, or woods. Trypanosoma brucei gambiense, the parasite responsible for about 90% of all cases of sleeping sickness, lives in tsetse flies in West and Central Africa. T. brucei rhodiense infects tsetse flies, and eventually people, in eastern and southern Africa.
When an infected tsetse fly bites a person, the bite can be painful and cause swelling. The parasite travels into the bloodstream and reproduces, causing early symptoms such as sweating, fever and headache. After invading the bloodstream, the parasite moves into the central nervous system. It becomes more difficult to treat sleeping sickness when the infection has reached this stage.
Sleeping sickness caused by T. brucei gamiense develops over a longer period of time than sleeping sickness caused by T. brucei rhodiense. Those who have been bitten by a fly infected with T. brucei gamiense can take months or even years to experience symptoms. In fact, by the time this type of sleeping sickness is diagnosed, the infection may have already passed to the central nervous system. T. brucei rhodiense sleeping sickness develops more rapidly and can affect the central nervous system within weeks.
Treatments for African trypanosomiasis depend on the stage at which the infection is diagnosed. Before the infection has spread to the central nervous system, African trypanosomiasis caused by T. brucei gamiense can be treated with pentamidine injections, and suramin can be used to treat infections caused by T. brucei rhodiense. In later stages, a form of arsenic, melarsopro, is used to treat both types of sleeping sickness. Another drug called eflornithine, which has fewer of the serious side effects of melarsopro, can be used to treat African trypanosomiasis caused by Trypanosoma brucei gambiense when the disease is more advanced.
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