By VERAH OKEYO
For a long time, physicians have thought bacteria causes pneumonia — Kenya’s number one child killer that claimed 21,584 in 2017 alone.
But a study spanning more than 30 years shows that 61 percent of the disease is caused by viruses, once again triggering a debate among experts on whether the Health ministry needs to revise its policy and treatment of pneumonia.
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The Pneumonia Etiology Research for Child Health (PERCH) study, a million-dollar research conducted in Kenya and six other countries with a high burden of the disease, found that viruses caused most of the severe cases.
The respiratory syncytial virus was the leading pathogen (31 per cent) at all sites in the 30 pathogens. Bacteria, which are eliminated from the body by antibiotics, only cause 27 per cent of pneumonia, the study showed. Read more…
