Fighting Malaria: a New Way of Thinking What’S the Most Dangerous Animal on the Planet? It’S Not a Lion, a Shark Or Even a Human
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APRIL 2016 AN INDEPENDENT SUPPLEMENT DISTRIBUTED IN THE GUARDIAN ON BEHALF OF MEDIAPLANET WHO TAKE SOLE RESPONSIBILITY FOR ITS CONTENTS MalariaMALARIAAWARENESS.CO.UK Aloe Blacc The singer speaks out on how we can be the generation to #EndMalaria INSIDE The role of community volunteers in Kenya’s fight against malaria P4 PERSONAL STORIES Meet three women fighting malaria head on P12 PHOTO: MALARIA NO MORE UK END MALARIA. FOR GOOD. Eliminating malaria will make the world a better, safer place for future generations and enable millions of people to reach their full potential. www.rollbackmalaria.org 2 MALARIAAWARENESS.CO.UK AN INDEPENDENT SUPPLEMENT BY MEDIAPLANET MEDIAPLANET IN THIS ISSUE READ MORE ON MALARIAAWARENESS.CO.UK What’s the most Home stretch Thunderclap! dangerous animal Mark Dybul on Join in and pledge on the planet? how the battle your support in the Richard Allan on the against malaria effort to #EndMalaria need for a new way can be fought - once and for all of thinking in order and won to beat malaria P8 P10 The hardest task is yet to come t’s no understate- made a huge impact, avert- complacent. Up to now, the targeted action on a regional ment to say that ing an estimated 6.2 million gains have been relatively and country level. historical, un- deaths with an effective com- easy, but the picture is be- We know we can deliver precedented pro- bination of vector control, coming more complex. In the results given the right in- gress has been improved diagnostics and addition to the challenges of vestment. History has shown made in the fight treatment. reaching populations at risk that. We need continued in- against malaria of malaria, drug and insec- vestment and commitment in the last 15 years. The situa- Tipping point ticide resistance threaten to to deliver programmes on the Ition we faced in the mid-1990s But the fight is far from make the job even harder. ground. At the same time, we was out of control. More than over. There are still an Dr Pedro Alonso Malaria is a highly hetero- need to broaden our intelli- a million people were losing astonishing 214 million cas- Director, WHO Global geneous disease, and one ap- gence, develop alternative Malaria Programme their lives to the disease each es of malaria each year and proach will not fit all situa- drugs and insecticides, year and we had no effective more than 400,000 deaths as tions. Last May, the World explore new approaches to tools to combat it. a result. Health Assembly approved vector control and continue Today the picture is very Consequently, we find our- a Global Technical Strategy the search for a successful different. Investment has selves at the tipping point. for Malaria, which gives us a malaria vaccine. In many re- been stepped up to more We either accelerate or we “The fight is far comprehensive framework spects, the hardest task is yet than US$2.5 billion a year. It’s run the risk of becoming from over” that can be translated into to come. Follow us facebook.com/MediaplanetUK @MediaplanetUK @MediaplanetUK Please recycle Senior Project Manager: Sandy SY Lee E-mail: [email protected] Business Developer: Rebecca Nicholson Content and Production Manager: Henrietta Hunter Designer: Vratislav Pecka Web Editor: Chris Schwartz Managing Director: Carl Soderblom Mediaplanet: Phone: +44 (0) 203 642 0737 E-mail: [email protected] Within KABS (German Mosquito Control Association), around 100 communities have merged their interest in a unique mosquito control programme based on the use of Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis. The research institute IfD (Institute for Dipterology) is the daughter institute of the KABS, dealing with the biology of Diptera with special consideration on mosquitoes with public health relevance. KABS (German Mosquito Control Association) www.kabsev.de IfD (Institute for Dipterology) www.institut-dipterologie.de Tel: +49-6232-990950 Email: [email protected] COMMERCIAL FEATURE Malaria and MDGs: mission accomplished? At the beginning of the the politicians in the room really asked if the SDGs would under- millennium, the battle wanted to hear. mine progress, Pedro Alonso, against malaria was The partnership between the Director of the WHO Global Mala- being lost.” This is the UK and the USA was described ria Programme, said that this sobering“ opening sentence of the as a gamechanger by Bernard would “come down to investment joint report by WHO and UNICEF, Nahlen, the Deputy Coordina- and political support.” However, launched on 17 Sept at the UK tor of the US President’s Malaria there was a “risk that dilution will Houses of Parliament, on the Initiative. “This commitment reduce impetus.” malaria target of the Millennium Onisillos Sekkides has been crucial,” he said, “in However, Nahlen was more Development Goals (MDGs): Deputy editor, The Lancet 2000 there was evidence that optimistic: despite the minor Achieving the Malaria MDG Tar- Infectious Diseases interventions would work, but mention of malaria among get. However, this is the prelude MDGs. Presented as heatmaps, resources were lacking. Now the SDGs, meeting these goals setting the scene for the report’s this article shows the striking these partnerships have pro- would inevitably mean addres- very welcome news. decline in P falciparum infection. vided those resources.” Provi- sing malaria. He also offered the The headline achievement is One of the paper’s authors, Peter ding additional emphasis of the reminder that, before the MDGs, the 60 per cent fall in the mala- Gething, outlined the crucial importance of tackling malaria, African ministries of health ria-associated death rate — from contribution of this work: he said he pointed out that the Roll Back were the source of the demand 47 per 100,000 at risk in 2000 that since 2000 “surveillance has Malaria Partnership’s report for action on malaria, and this to 19 per 100,000 in 2015. This been transformed and this has Action and Investment to Defeat would certainly continue to be equates to a total of 6.2 million similarly had a transformative Malaria 2016–2030 showed that the case. But his optimism came lives saved. Clearly a great achie- effect on policy.” “malaria represents an impe- with a warning, if we “back off vement. Also, the report shows However, throughout the diment to economic develop- now, it will be a disaster.” that incidence of malaria is in launch event many speakers ment.” This report outlines that Looking ahead, the WHO/ decline. Taken together, with were keen to sound a note of if coverage were to revert to 2007 UNICEF report says that “the the addition of achievements caution and ensure the positive levels then US$1.2 trillion of eco- rate or expansion of malaria pro- on children younger than five news in this report did not obs- nomic output would be foregone grammes between 2016 and 2030 years sleeping under bednets cure the enormous task that still from 2016 to 2030. But Nahlen has been mapped out, and fun- and receiving antimalarials, the lay ahead. Just in 2015, there were offered reassurances about the ding requirements to meet these report states that this means an estimated 214 million new commitment of the USA to mala- milestones for 2020, 2025, and that the malaria-specific tar- cases of malaria with 438,000 ria because of its cross-party sup- 2030 have been identified.” These get of the MDGs “has been met deaths. And despite progress, port in Congress. requirements are $6.4 billion convincingly.” almost half the world’s popula- Now that the MDGs have by 2020, $7.7 billion by 2025, and The source data in the report tion is still at risk of malaria. This reached their conclusion, atten- $8.7 billion by 2030. Although were published simultaneously acknowledgement of the work tion is shifting to the next set of the figures will make many in a research article that map- still needed prompted a remin- goals: the Sustainable Develop- politicians wince, against the ped the effect of malaria control der that despite the significant ment Goals (SDGs). Controver- backdrop of the potential cost of on Plasmodium falciparum in increase in funding for malaria it sially, malaria is now one of nine insufficient action they might be Africa over the lifetime of the is still not enough. Not a message targets for one of 17 goals. When easy to swallow. 4 MALARIAAWARENESS.CO.UK AN INDEPENDENT SUPPLEMENT BY MEDIAPLANET INSPIRATION COLUMN New test Dr Anne Musuva-Njoroge Director, malaria & child health, revolutionises Population Services Kenya fight against Community volunteers are key to Kenya’s fight against malaria malaria ccording to the World Bank, between 2003 and 2014, the percentage of households owning in- In order to successfully eradicate malaria, A secticide treated nets in Kenya rose from six you need to know where to find it. New per cent to 59 per cent. With the increased use of nets, currently around 42 per cent, the country has seen in- technology could hold the key to identifying fant mortality fall by 7.6 per cent each year since 2005. Despite the success of recent malaria control ef- the hidden enemy and stopping it in its tracks forts, Dr Anne Musuva-Njoroge, director of malaria & child health at Population Services Kenya notes, By Kate Sharma “there is a reduction in coverage of nets between the mass net distribution campaigns which occur every three to four years.” hile microscopy laria diagnosis. Using loop mediated isother- Between 2014 and 2015 the country piloted a com- and rapid diag- mal amplification (LAMP) to identify the ma- munity net distribution programme targeting 60,000 nostics testing laria parasite, the technology can produce people in 12,315 households to look for a more cost-ef- is helping to di- results within an hour without the need for fective and efficient way to sustain universal cover- agnose a huge laboratory facilities.