{"doi":"10.4269/ajtmh.23-0608","title":"Serological Responses to Trachoma Antigens prior to the Start of Mass Drug Administration: Results from Population-Based Baseline Surveys, North Darfur, Sudan","abstract":"After years of programmatic inaccessibility, in 2019-2020 the Sudan Federal Ministry of Health Trachoma Control Program conducted population-based trachoma surveys in three localities (districts) in North Darfur state, Sudan. These baseline surveys were to determine the prevalence of trachomatous inflammation-follicular (TF) among children aged 1-9 years and to further use serological markers to understand the historical trachoma burden within this mass drug administration (MDA)-naive area. Trained and certified graders collected trachoma clinical data, and trained nurses collected dried blood spot (DBS) samples. The DBSs were assayed on a multiplex bead array for antibody responses to the Chlamydia trachomatis antigens Pgp3 and CT694. Across the three localities, 3,613 individuals aged 1-9 years and 3,542 individuals aged ≥15 years were examined for clinical signs, and 8,322 DBSs were collected. The prevalence of TF among children aged 1-9 years was endemic (≥5%) in two localities (El Seraif, 15.6%, and Saraf Omrah, 11.0%) and below the TF elimination threshold (<5%) in the third (Kotom, 1.4%). The Pgp3 seroprevalence among children aged 1-9 years was 34.1% in El Seraif, 35.0% in Saraf Omrah, and 11.0% in Kotom. Locality prevalence results were similar for Pgp3 and CT694. Seroprevalence increased with age in all three localities. Serological data collected within these surveys demonstrate that all three localities have had a long history of exposure to Chlamydia trachomatis and that two of the three localities require MDA to reach elimination as a public health problem threshold.","journal":"American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene","year":2024,"id":476624,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":2,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9458,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2024-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":1314535,"name":"Balgesa Elkheir Elshafie","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1314536,"name":"Zeinab Abdalla","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":708780,"name":"Courtney Simmons","orcid":"0000-0002-3613-2377","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1044685,"name":"E. Brook Goodhew","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1314139,"name":"Tania A. Gonzalez","orcid":"0009-0006-6692-796X","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1314140,"name":"Andrew W. Nute","orcid":"0000-0001-8957-0955","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1314537,"name":"Atif Mohammed","orcid":null,"position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":424270,"name":"E. Kelly Callahan","orcid":"0000-0002-4057-9411","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":424272,"name":"Diana L. Martin","orcid":"0000-0001-9417-5562","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":392041,"name":"Scott D. Nash","orcid":"0000-0001-5741-8537","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1314138,"name":"Angelia M. Sanders","orcid":"0000-0002-7284-0303","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":21,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:06:29.605760Z","pmid":"38507810","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}