By Michael Kahn

LONDON, Sept 24 (Reuters) - At least one person in nearly every household in a part of southern Sudan had signs of trachoma, one of the highest rates ever recorded for the blinding eye disease, researchers said on Wednesday.

The findings among villagers in Ayod County in the oil-rich area of Jonglei State east of the river Nile highlight the urgent need for antibiotics and corrective surgery to tackle the condition -- the world's leading cause of preventable blindness, the researchers said.

"Communities in Ayod are in urgent need of interventions to eliminate trachoma as a public health problem," Jonathan King of the U.S. Carter Center in Atlanta and his colleagues wrote in the journal PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases.

"Active trachoma in Ayod is among the highest reported globally."

The World Health Organisation estimates that six million people worldwide are blind due to trachoma and more than 150 million people, mostly rural poor in developing nations, need treatment.

The eye infection is passed on by hands, clothing or flies that land on the face and is most common where poor hygiene and lack of water are a problem.

Trachoma causes a sticky discharge from the eye, damage to the cornea, and blindness can result from recurring infections. Antibiotics can work early on but surgery is needed for people with advanced stages of the condition.

The researchers did not look at the reason for the high rates but noted civil war has degraded local health services and contributed to a lack of water and sanitation in villages where trachoma and other tropical diseases proliferate.

"Increasing access to improved water sources may not only improve hygiene but also reduce the spread of guinea worm and other water borne diseases," the researchers said.

The researchers examined 2,335 people from 392 households living in twenty villages of Ayod County where 1 in 3 households had a person with severe blinding trachoma.

"Including Ayod, surveys in 12 other areas in Southern Sudan have consistently demonstrated the unreasonably high burden of trachoma," the researchers said. (Editing by Maggie Fox and Louise Ireland)

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