Prevalence of ascariasis and amebiasis in Cherokee Indian school children.

Single stool specimens, collected from each of 631 children at the Cherokee Indian Elementary School, Cherokee, N.C., were examined for intestinal parasites. Evidence of infection with one or more parasites was found in 92 percent of the children. The amebic prevalence rate, which can be used to measure the extent of ingestion of organisms through fecal contamination, was 74 percent. There was no difference in the prevalence of A. lumbricoides or T. trichiura between Indian boys and girls. Although there was a slight reduction in the prevalence of some parasites in children of the higher elementary grades as compared with the lower ones, in many cases an equal or greater number of children in the higher grades were parasitized with E. histolytica and E. hartmanni as compared with children in the lower grades. In general, the survey revealed a high prevalence of intestinal parasites in children throughout the eight grades of the school.