A school-based health education package for prevention of soil-transmitted helminth infections in the Philippines

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Our central thesis is that a video-based health educational package, developed by our group, targeting schoolchildren, can influence their behaviour in a way conducive to the prevention of parasitic worm infections, thereby playing a pivotal role in the sustainable control and prevention of Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) globally. An extensive school-based field trial targeting Chinese schoolchildren undertaken by our multidisciplinary team in Hunan province, China established proof of principle that our video-based health educational package widens student knowledge and changes behaviour, resulting in fewer STH infections. To evaluate the potential for up-scaling of our video-based health educational package as a universal school-focused educational tool forming part of multi-component sustainable integrated NTD control programs, we wish to assess the generalisability of our findings in different countries. This will provide an evidence base for translation of the package into public health policy and practice in the Asian region and beyond. We will test the hypothesis that: A video-based health educational package (for use in schools) targeting STH increases student knowledge of the worms, their transmission, symptoms, treatment and prevention, and changes hygiene behaviour, thus preventing infections in children in diverse ethnic and endemic settings. We will test this hypothesis with the following specific aim: To determine if the video-based health educational package (for use in schools) is effective in preventing STH infection in schoolchildren in Laguna, Philippines.