Too Dizzy to Work
Early symptoms of sleeping sickness include fever, headaches, joint pain, and itching. The drugs used to treat people in the early stages of the disease are relatively easy to administer and non-toxic. The earlier the disease is identified, the better chance there is of a cure.
In the second stage, parasites cross the blood-brain barrier and infect the central nervous system. This is when more obvious signs of the disease appear, including a disturbed sleep cycle, which gives sleeping sickness its name.
Germaine began showing symptoms of sleeping sickness three months ago, after the birth of her third child. Suffering from fatigue and vertigo, she wasn’t able to go to the fields to work. “I was so dizzy I would fall to the ground,” she recalls. “I had no energy, I couldn’t eat, and I could only take sips of water.”
Germaine will spend seven days in the clinic to receive injections of the drug pentamadine. “My family couldn’t understand what was wrong with me,” says Germaine. “They are so relieved that I’m getting treatment and am already starting to feel better.”