PMI Expansion Malaria Treatment for 90 Million More People

In late September, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) announced that they would be leading an enterprise to expand the President’s Malaria Initiative (PMI). The PMI expansion is expected to bring life-saving malaria prevention and treatment to four additional countries: Cameroon, Cote D’Ivoire, Niger and Sierra Leone. With these additions, PMI will have programs operating in 24 Sub-Saharan African countries where malaria poses a genuine public health threat.

Launched in 2005, PMI is an interagency initiative in collaboration with USAID and in conjunction with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. PMI was originally established with the goal of cutting mortality caused by malaria in half across 15 African countries. This came during a time when the U.S. decided to put malaria control at the forefront of its global aid agenda. It seeks to approach this goal by increasing concentration on four essential malaria treatment and prevention measures: insecticide-treated mosquito nets, indoor residual spraying, accurate diagnoses and preventative prenatal treatments. With its focused strategy, PMI has contributed to the aversion of 6.8 million malaria-related deaths between 2001 and 2015. In 2016 alone, PMI protected over 16 million people by spraying homes with insecticide and distributed 42 million bed nets.

In total, approximately 480 million people have benefited from the work being done by PMI. This latest PMI expansion will bring malaria treatment and prevention to an additional 90 million people. This is spectacular news given how life-threatening the disease still is, even after so much progress has been made. Today, malaria still takes the life of a child every 30 seconds, amounting to a staggering 3,000 children every single day. Though heartbreaking, this statistic should not come as a surprise, considering 40 percent of the world’s population lives in high-risk regions for malaria. With the continued effort aid agencies like PMI and USAID, that number is projected to decrease significantly. Hopefully, sometime in the coming years, the world will witness the complete eradication of malaria.

– Micaela Fischer

Photo: Flickr

Combating Malaria Threat Important for Poverty Alleviation

Despite the progress being made in improving global healthcare, malaria still remains a pressing concern. After HIV, it is becoming one of the most ubiquitous diseases in war-torn and impoverished countries, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. The impacts of malaria can be especially debilitating for the poor. Even though the threat of malaria has decreased during the past 15 years, it still belongs to the group of 20 ‘’neglected tropical diseases’’.

Malaria is a disease caused by the Plasmodium parasite that is secreted by the bite of the female Anopheles mosquito. Anopheles mosquitos often lay their eggs in stagnant water, after which these eggs become adult mosquitos. The disease is prevalent in areas with poor sanitation and hygiene facilities, making it especially common and potentially dangerous in refugee camps.

The WHO estimated in 2015 that nearly half the world’s population is vulnerable to malaria, with a significant proportion concentrated mainly in sub-Saharan African countries. In 2015 alone, there were more than 222 million cases of malaria recorded, with a death toll of nearly 492,000. It was discovered that there is a link between climate change and the threat of malaria and other diseases. Global warming is resulting in an increase in global temperatures, which creates a more favorable environment for Anopheles mosquitos.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a renowned organization spearheading development funding and global health initiatives, has spoken about the U.S. budget cuts to foreign aid and healthcare. Achieving further progress in countering the malaria threat will be hindered by these cuts. Their analysis estimated that this decrease would lead to an additional 5 million deaths by 2030.

Fortunately, UNICEF noted that between 2000 and 2005, the malaria mortality rate has actually fallen by around 37 percent globally. Artemisinin-based therapies have been quite successful in reducing the harmful impacts of Plasmodium falciparum, one of the most deadly forms of malaria.

Many of the countries most affected by malaria are stepping up their efforts to combat the disease. Rwanda is treating the malaria threat with insecticide-treated nets, indoor residual spraying and the use of artemisinin-based drugs.

Nigeria alone accounts for nearly 25 percent of the malaria cases in Africa, which is one of the leading causes of premature death in the country. The Global Fund is working in Nigeria to treat the record levels of malaria cases and control the spread of the disease. WHO is also scaling up its operations in addressing the malaria threat in the country.

The recent malaria prevention drive in South Africa reaffirmed its support for alleviating the malaria threat in the country. The initiative is a collaborative agreement between South Africa, Swaziland and Mozambique. The high incidence of diseases like HIV in South Africa often exacerbates the impact of malaria, making it particularly important to be addressed.

Working on preventive and mitigation efforts for malaria will go a long way towards addressing the rampant spread of the disease. The progress currently being made in reducing the malaria threat will yield successful results in the future.

– Shivani Ekkanath
Photo: Flickr

Successes Combating Common Diseases in Tanzania

Gender inequality, limited access to safe water, lack of sanitation, poor hygiene and a recent drop in immunization are major issues Tanzanian citizens face in urban and rural areas of the country. These factors have contributed to the rampant spread of three common diseases in Tanzania: HIV and AIDS, cholera and malaria.

The most common disease affecting the Tanzanian populace is HIV and AIDS. HIV is a virus that attacks the immune system, the body’s natural defense against disease. The immune system is destroyed when left untreated and the person cannot recover from infections, big or small. At this stage, the person has AIDS.

According to the World Factbook, in 2015, almost 1.4 million people in Tanzania were living with AIDS. This is the most recent estimate. Also reported by the same source, Tanzania ranks sixth in comparison to the rest of the world with the number of its citizens living with the disease.

HIV is the main source of adult mortality in the country. The World Factbook states that in 2015 an estimated 35,700 Tanzanian adults died from the disease, placing the country in fourth place in comparison to the rest of the world.

According to the charity organization, AVERT, the populations most affected by HIV in Tanzania are people who inject drugs, men who have sex with men, mobile populations and sex workers. Of all HIV infections, 80 percent of them result from heterosexual sex. Tanzanian women are infected more than men due to having older partners, getting married earlier and neglecting negotiating skills for safer sex due to gender inequality.

The second of the most common diseases in Tanzania population is cholera. Cholera is a bacterial disease usually spread through contaminated water. Cholera causes severe diarrhea and dehydration. Cholera kills infected persons within hours when left untreated.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), by April 20, 2016 there was a total of 24,108 cases of cholera in Tanzania, including 378 deaths. The majority of the cases were reported from 23 regions in mainland Tanzania (20,961 cases, including 329 deaths). Neighboring Zanzibar islands reported 3,057 cases of the disease, including 51 deaths.

The disease spread quickly due to conducive conditions such as limited access to safe water in poor households, sanitary problems and poor hygiene found in both mainland Tanzania and Zanzibar. In addition, the nation’s water supply institutions lacked the capacity to disinfect water and conduct regular water quality monitoring and assessments.

Recently, there has been a decline in the number of newly reported cases of cholera. However, the conditions that helped the disease to persist still have not changed, so risk for more infections remains high.

The final common disease affecting the Tanzanian population is malaria. Malaria is a life-threatening disease caused by parasites that are transmitted to people through the bites of infected female Anopheles mosquitoes. Mild symptoms include fever, headache and chills. Severe symptoms include anemia, difficulty breathing due to fluid-filled lungs and cerebral malaria in children. In adults, organ failure is also frequent.

The World Factbook reports malaria is a leading killer of children under five in Tanzania. According to the Malaria Spot website, Tanzania has the third-largest population at risk of malaria in Africa. Over 90 percent of the population live in areas where there is malaria. Each year, 10 to 12 million people contract malaria and 80,000 die from the disease, most of them children. There is no vaccine for malaria. This fact contributes to why the disease continues to be a threat for Tanzanians.

Common diseases in Tanzania are prevalent because the geographical and economic conditions of the country favor their spread. While HIV and AIDS, cholera and malaria have been a threat to the population there has been positive strides. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) has been working with the government of the United Republic of Tanzania and more than 60 partner organizations since 2001 to address HIV, malaria, and other health threats by helping support service delivery and strengthen health systems and infrastructure. The CDC partnership has seen success, including:

• 637,875 people are currently receiving HIV treatment
• 74,430 pregnant women have received medication to reduce transmission to their babies through PEPFAR (The United States President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) since 2010
• 1,155,833 men have been circumcised to prevent new HIV infections since 2010
• New malaria infections have decreased from 18 percent to 10 percent in children 6-59 months in 2011-2012

With continued aid and improvement in living conditions for the Tanzanian people, common diseases in Tanzania will no longer remain common.

– Jeanine Thomas

Photo: Flickr

New Malaria Vaccine Trial Could Mean the Disease’s End

Malaria is one of the deadliest diseases afflicting developing countries across the world. In 2015 alone, it took the lives of 429,000 people, with a majority being African children. The most developed malaria vaccine trial is currently scheduled to be used in parts of Africa beginning next year, where the disease is still rampant.

Miguel Prudêncio and his team at iMM Lisboa, a biomedical research nonprofit institution, have been researching solutions to end malaria in the area. They decided to approach malaria as scientist Edward Jenner approached smallpox, by using a less harmful version of it as a shield against deadlier versions. In a similar fashion to how Jenner used cowpox to fight smallpox, Prudêncio and fellow researchers at iMM Lisboa wanted to conduct a malaria vaccine trial using a rodent version of the malaria-causing parasite. iMM Lisboa is going to carry out the trial with the help of the Radbound University Medical Center, based in the Netherlands, and PATH in Seattle.

The new malaria vaccine trial will take place at Radbounumc in the Netherlands. The first half of the trial will involve three groups of six volunteers, with each team enduring a different number of bites from mosquitos exposed to the parasite. Each volunteer will be thoroughly examined after the process because of the risk that comes from exposure. This examination will continue until the researchers can decide that it is safe to begin the second half of their malaria vaccine trial. The goal is that “the modified rodent parasite will help induce a protective response in healthy human volunteers.”

This will be the first time that humans will be purposely introduced to the rodent version of the parasite. The volunteers’ reaction to the first part of this malaria vaccine trial will be a deciding factor as to the effectiveness of this approach. With luck, the second phase will prove that smallpox is not the only disease that can be fought off by genetically modified versions of itself.

The success of this malaria vaccine trial could mean saving the lives of hundreds of thousands of people in the future. Ultimately, the goal is to see malaria eradicated just like smallpox, but in upcoming years it will be a breakthrough if a vaccine is developed with a protective efficacy of at least 75 percent against malaria. Prudêncio and his fellow researchers are hoping to achieve the elimination of malaria once their vaccine trial is complete.

– Mackenzie Fielder

Photo: Flickr

Malaria Epidemic in Indonesia

Global organizations have made significant strides in fighting the malaria epidemic in Indonesia by focusing on the health and welfare of pregnant women and children.

In an article published by IRIN, William Hawley, a malaria expert with the U.N. Children’s Fund (UNICEF), highlighted the importance of malaria treatment and prevention against the disease.

“Pregnant women and children are especially vulnerable to malaria, and modern malaria diagnosis and prevention can be delivered via existing maternal health and immunization services in a symbiotic way,” Hawley said.

World health organizations such as UNICEF have been working closely with Indonesian government agencies and world health programs to provide free and affordable care to women and children in the region.

“The malaria program, the antenatal care program, and the expanded program on immunization all benefit, but most important — women and kids benefit,” Hawley said.

According to the article by IRIN, nurses and midwives have been helping pregnant women and infants fight malaria by providing diagnosis, treatment and information regarding the disease. In response, more women have been provided antenatal care and more children have been immunized against malaria.

The Harsh Effects of the Malaria Epidemic in Indonesia

Malaria is a disease spread by mosquitoes causing symptoms including fever, exhaustion, vomiting, and headaches. Severe cases generally include yellowing of the skin, seizures, coma, or, in the most extreme instances, death.

The disease can be more dangerous to pregnant women and infants causing stillbirths, low birth weight, abortion and infant mortality. Malaria can also cause severe respiratory problems in both adults and children.

According to a report published by the World Health Organization (WHO), out of a population of close to 260 million, 190 million people were reportedly malaria free in 2015. This comes after a significant number of cases were reported between 2009 and 2012.

With the help of finances provided by the Global Fund, WHO, and UNICEF, residents of Indonesia have access to preventative measures against the disease in the form of mosquito nets, insect repellents, and insecticides. Residents are also taught the importance of mosquito control measures such as draining water to prevent reproduction.

According to a report by the CDC, with funding from UNICEF, USAID, the Gates Foundation and the Ministry of Health (MOH), many preventative programs have been integrated into immunization and prenatal care programs in five provinces in eastern Indonesia.

These organizations hope to expand to all areas where the disease continuously occurs to help fight the malaria epidemic in Indonesia.

– Drew Hazzard

Photo: Flickr