NT’s rheumatic fever cases more than double in four years: report

More than 97 per cent of sufferers in the NT were indigenous and experts say poor housing and poverty are to blame.

The majority of rheumatic fever sufferers in the NT live in remote Aboriginal communities.

THE rate of acute rheumatic fever diagnoses in the NT more than doubled during the four years to 2017, new research has revealed.

The figures published by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare today show there were 275 cases of the disease in 2017, up from 131 in 2013.

More than 97 per cent of sufferers in the NT were indigenous and Menzies School of Health Research honorary fellow Suzanne Belton said poor housing and overcrowding were to blame.

“The ultimate causation for rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease is poor housing conditions and poverty and we haven’t really addressed that very well in the NT,” she said.

“It will be true that in years to come we will still be having cases of rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease because if you don’t address poverty and poor housing standards indigenous people will continue to be affected by this disease.”

But Dr Belton said the figures weren’t necessarily all doom and gloom, with more diagnoses meaning more sufferers could be treated before it was too late.

“In a way it could be a positive thing when you find increasing numbers because otherwise those cases could be missed and they’re usually children or young adults and they don’t get the treatment they need,” she said.

Dr Belton said the high rates of heart disease were not news to indigenous communities and locals were being now more proactive in attacking the problem.

“If a big sister or big brother notice the little ones have sore throats, they often end up taking them to the health centre to have their throats swabbed,” she said.

“So indigenous people themselves are working on it.”

Because rheumatic fever has all but been eliminated in major centres Dr Belton said the problem was hard to diagnose but there were plans to develop a simple blood test which could help catch it earlier in future.

“Doctors and nurses, especially if they come from other parts of Australia, are not used to diagnosing this, it’s rare in every other jurisdiction,” she said.

“It would be a bit like saying there’s a kid with polio — no doctor on Earth has seen a kid with polio for decades so they don’t have the clinical skills.”