DAMASCUS, Syria (North Press) – For more than three months, the 15-year-old Maya Abdo suffered from constant itching on her fingers and elbows. The tablets prescribed by doctors at the Dermatology Hospital in Damascus took weeks to relieve her symptoms.
Nahla al-Abdullah, who used to accompany her daughter Maya to the hospital, attributes the cause of her daughter’s health condition to the circumstances she is living in.
Scabies is a common dermatological condition that causes intense itching. Though it is treatable, but the recent spread of scabies in the Syrian capital highlights severe living crises that the country is going through.
Scabies is not the only infection to spread in Syria. Scabies was preceded by the spread of lice, cholera, septic hepatitis and other epidemics, which were brought back by bad economic conditions the country has been witnessing since 2011 when war started.
Overcrowding in small residential spaces due to the bad living situation, lack of fuel that increased rationing hours of electricity to unprecedented levels which in turn affect personal hygiene, lack of adequate medication, and misdiagnosis are some of the most notably key reasons for the spread of the scabies in Damascus.
Tight spaces cause rapid spread
Like most of her neighbors, al-Abdullah lives with her family in a small apartment, which they share with five other families, to reduce the rent; after they were displaced from their homes in Idlib, fleeing battles between Syrian government forces and opposition factions.
She said that they all share same tools in kitchen, bathroom, towels, and sleeping equipment, and that there are no other options in light of high rents and the lack of income.
To reduce expenses as much as possible, al-Abdullah collects clothes of more than one family, and washes them together in a semi-manual washing machine if electricity is available, or by hands in many cases.
“It is difficult to achieving personal hygiene amid such conditions whether in terms of availability of water, electricity, or hygiene material,” she noted.
Overcrowded spaces spread highly contagious ailments like scabies, caused by an infestation of a parasitic mite, according to a health worker in the Dermatology Hospital in Damascus.
Al-Abdullah indicated that she along with other families who live in the same house use poor-quality detergents, whose price is commensurate with their income.
Alarming situation
A medical source at the Dermatology Hospital in Damascus told North Press that the number of people with scabies who come to the hospital daily has reached ten, “then it is of course alarming.”
The medical source noted that the clinical stories of the patients show that not all family members are infected or show the symptoms, as those are considered a source of infection even if they do not show any symptoms.
“There is no way we can further improve the living conditions in the city right now, but the health minister must take the situation seriously and make the necessary steps to combat the scabies outbreak before it’s too late,” the source said.
Misdiagnosis
A dermatologist in the Damascus countryside told North Press that she received many patients with scabies who were misdiagnosed and received wrong treatments.
Doctors are not aware of the fact that scabies is spreading in the country, and they treated cases of itching as if they were eczema or allergies, which contributed to the spread of the disease among people who live with infected ones, the doctor further added.
This epidemic was preceded by the spread of cholera and lice among school students, all of this is the result of poor living conditions
“Since the living conditions cannot change overnight, the government should start awareness campaigns and offer adequate medicine so that at least the number of infection can be minimized, even if in a slow process.”