A disease whose progression and symptoms seem straight out of a horror movie but which can be treated has killed at least 20 Ugandans and sickened more than 20,000 in just two months.
Jiggers, small insects which look like fleas, are the culprits in the epidemic which causes parts of the body to rot. They often enter through the feet. Once inside a person's body, they suck the blood, grow and breed, multiplying by the hundreds. Affected body parts - buttocks, lips, even eyelids - rot away.
James Kakooza, Uganda's minister of state for primary health care, said jiggers can easily kill young children by sucking their blood and can cause early deaths in grown-ups who have other diseases. Most of hose infected, especially the elderly, cannot walk or work.
"It is an epidemic which we are fighting against and I am sure over time we will eradicate the jiggers," Kakooza said.
The insects breed in dirty, dusty places. The medical name for the parasitic disease is tungiasis, which is caused by the female sand fly burrowing into the skin. It exists in parts of Latin America and the Caribbean, besides sub-Saharan Africa.
Kakooza said health workers are telling residents of the 12 affected districts in Uganda that jiggers thrive amid poor hygienic conditions.
"We are also telling them to use medicated soap. They can apply petrol and paraffin in places infested by jiggers and they die," Kakooza said.
The most affected part of Uganda is the Busoga region in the east, 150 kilometers (90 miles) from Kampala, Uganda's capital. Some cases have been reported in the central region, less than 70 kilometers (43 miles) from the city, which has led to fears the whole country might be affected.
Some think jiggers - whose scientific name is Tunga penetrans - were brought to Uganda and other east African countries by migrants from India who constructed the railway from Mombasa, the Kenyan seaport, to Kampala i the 19th century. Others say they came to Africa aboard a British ship that sailed from Brazil.
