Original upload date: Tue, 21 May 2013 00:00:00 GMT
Archive date: Sun, 05 Dec 2021 20:56:01 GMT
Konzo is a distinct type of upper motoneuron disease. Konzo, a disease which has been reported only from poor rural communities in Africa, is characterized by the abrupt onset of an isolated and symm
...
etric spastic paraparesis which is permanent but non-progressive. The name derives from the local designation used by the population Bandundu Province in present-day Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo, previously Zaïre) affected by the first reported outbreak in 1936. Konzo means tied legs, and is a good description of the resulting spastic gait.
This film was shot in DR Congo in 1995 by Prof Thorkild Tylleskar, University of Bergen, Norway together with PRONANUT (Programme National de Nutrition, in Kinshasa DR Congo) lead by Dr Jean-Pierre Banea-Mayambu (head of PRONANUT) and Dr Desire Tshala-Katumbay from the Neurology clinic at Centre NeuroPsychoPathologique, CNPP, Kinshasa) and prepared by a group of students in Nutrition at the Uppsala University, Sweden in 1997 as a group work in Global Nutrition. There are three errors in the speaker text: at 4 minutes: the toxic compound is "cyanogenic glucosides" not cyanide; and at 5:30 the urine contains 'thiocyanate' not 'cyanide'; at 6:40 should be: 'exaggerated knee or ankle reflexes (not 'reflects') and trembling legs due to clonus (not 'contractures').
The young boy is named 'Mwanza'.
