A year after Jimmy Carter’s death, the disease he swore to eradicate reaches an all-time low

The Carter Center’s decades-long battle against an ancient parasite affecting some of the world’s poorest people may soon be won.

After leaving the White House, former President Jimmy Carter made the eradication of dracunculiasis a top priority of the Carter Center, the nonprofit he founded with his wife, Rosalynn Carter. Aides said that even after entering home hospice in 2023, Carter continued to ask for updates on Guinea worm disease.

Guinea worm disease is rarely fatal but can cause excruciating pain and debilitation, and the larvae can grow into worms up to 3 feet long in people’s bodies if they drink water contaminated with the larvae. The noodle-thin parasites then dig their way through the skin, forming burning blisters.

To eliminate the parasite, the worm must be gently wrapped around a stick and slowly pulled across the skin. Removing the entire worm without destroying it can take weeks.

When the Carter Center began leading the global campaign to eradicate Guinea worm, an estimated 3.5 million people in 21 African and Asian countries were living with the disease. On World NTD Day on Friday, the center announced that only 10 human cases have been reported globally.

Two of the provisional cases were found in South Sudan, four in Chad and four in Ethiopia, the center said.

The figures remain provisional until each country is formally confirmed during the campaign’s annual meeting, usually held in April.

“President Carter always said he wanted to outlast the last Guinea worm,” said Paige Alexander, CEO of the Carter Center. “While he didn’t quite get his wish, he and Mrs. Carter will be proud to know that only 10 human cases will be reported in 2025. They will remind us that this work will continue until we reach zero.”

Conquer disease through persuasion

Guinea worm disease would become the second human disease in history, after smallpox, to be eradicated. Notably, this will be the first without a drug or vaccine.

Rather than finding a cure, the campaign is trying to break the worm’s life cycle in parasite communities and convince millions of people to change their behavior.

Staff from the center and the host government trained volunteers, teaching neighbors how to filter water through cloth mesh to remove tiny fleas that carry larvae. Villagers learned to observe and report new cases – often receiving rewards of $100 or more. Infected people and dogs must be prevented from contaminating water supplies.

Health workers investigate every report of illness. The Carter Center said it investigated more than 1 million rumors in 2025, most within 24 hours of being notified.

“This event reflects the values ​​that shaped my grandparents’ lives, the belief that hope, hard work and respect for everyone can change the world,” said Jason Carter, chairman of the Carter Center’s board of directors and Jimmy and Rosalynn’s eldest grandson. “Seeing Guinea worm cases reaching historic lows is the clearest expression of that tradition and one of the clearest expressions of our commitment to a community that earns its trust.”

Jimmy Carter makes it personal mission to eradicate virus

Mr. Carter’s fundraising enabled the center to invest $500 million in the fight against dracunculiasis. He persuaded manufacturers to donate larvicides as well as nylon cloth and special straws for filtering water. His visits to affected villages often generated news coverage and raised global awareness.

“He went to a lot of places where people were suffering,” said Dr. William Brigg, a professor of international health at Johns Hopkins University who has worked in Africa for 25 years. “His personal experience and highlighting the plight of people who were suffering brought attention to it, and I think that had an important impact.”

Carter first observed the disease up close in 1988 when he visited a village in Ghana, where nearly 350 people had worms in their skin. He approaches a young woman who appears to be holding a baby in her arms.

“But no children,” Carter wrote in his 2014 book “A Call to Action.” “Instead she was holding her right breast, which was almost a foot long, with a worm in the nipple.”

Carter used his position to influence other leaders to take a greater role. Some heads of state are stimulated by the centre’s charts and communications, which show which countries are making progress and which are lagging behind.

During the resurgence of the epidemic in Ghana in 2007, Carter visited a hospital packed with suffering children and adults and publicly suggested that the disease might be renamed “Ghana worm disease,” spurring the country’s leaders to take action. Ghana ended the spread within three years.

The World Health Organization’s eradication target is 2030. Carter Center leaders hope to achieve this goal sooner rather than later.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.