Epidemic of Bilateral Optic Neuropathy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

To the Editor: An epidemic of bilateral optic neuropathy, often with sensorineural hearing loss and symptoms of peripheral neuropathy, is affecting young adults in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.^1,2 The disease is clinically identical to that seen in the recent epidemic of bilateral optic neuropathy in Cuba.³ We conducted a community survey to determine the magnitude of the epidemic. We used stratified simple random sampling to select a sample of 1078 persons, 10 to 39 years old, in the 21 residential areas of Dar es Salaam (population, 3.8 million), of whom 927 (86.0 percent) were examined for signs of the . . .