Fighting malaria with mosquito nets

YOUR status doesn't matter. She is able to stealthily conduct unauthorised blood donations. Her slender body, long legs and narrow wings fit her description - the resurgent killer.
Actually she is very active at night and likes exposed body parts like hands, the face and the neck.

She is the Anopheles mosquito.
Come to think of it, these little female bloodsuckers have a wretched habit of biting people and spreading diseases such as malaria, encephalitis and dengue.
One can run, but hiding is close to impossible unless under a mosquito net, an impregnated (treated) one is even better.

Aside from skin chemicals, mosquitoes have other ways of finding you because they can detect both carbon dioxide and lactic acid (produced by muscle metabolism) in your breath.

They can also detect infrared light from your body.
In the morning, one can see these engorged insects, a polite term for a bug that is too heavy with human blood to move, resting to digest their nutritious meal of blood.

It is these bloodsuckers whose economic cost is astronomical as a result of malaria.

The small creatures' impact costs most African countries US$12 billion annually and has slowed economic growth in some African countries by 1.3 per cent yearly.
Malaria kills millions of people every year, 3000 people every day.

The disease is found throughout the tropical and subtropical regions of the world and causes more than 300 million acute illnesses and at least one million deaths each year. Ninety per cent of these deaths occur among children under age five in sub-Saharan Africa; malaria kills an African child every 30 seconds! Those who survive an episode of severe malaria may suffer from a range of physical and mental disabilities, but ironically, people are usually scared of bed bugs, HIV and cockroaches!

In fact, according to Zambia's National Malaria Control Centre and the Ministry of Health, some 40 per cent of the world's population is at risk of malaria and the vast majority live in the world's poorest countries. So what weapons need to be used to fight malaria?

The weapons in the fight against malaria are the mosquito nets, spraying and political commitment.

But nets go with a cost. Some aid agencies and governments are willing to pick up the cost.

Amid promising international steps in fighting malaria, aid groups such as World Vision are urging the humanitarian community to pay close attention to the way protective bed nets are being distributed in vulnerable countries, to maximise their impact against the disease.

In Zambia for instance, World Vision has began a large-scale household distribution of bed nets as part of a two-year initiative to provide 3 million insecticide-treated bed nets to protect some 6 million people at risk of malaria in Zambia, Kenya, Mozambique and Mali.

"A pickup in efforts to get more bed nets to hard-hit places has proven to be an encouraging start, but achieving the goal of stopping deaths means we must ensure efforts to combat malaria are doing the most good possible," said Craig Jaggers, World Vision's policy advisor for health. "We know that delivering bed nets at the household level, with follow-up by trained caregivers, raises the likelihood they'll be used well and save lives."

There are signs of progress from increased anti-malaria efforts seen through a decline in overall global deaths of children under five, as measured by UNICEF, from 9.2 million to 8.8 million children each year, attributed partly to more mosquito-net distribution in vulnerable areas.

More recently, 20 African heads of state formed the African Leaders Malaria Alliance during United Nations meetings last month, with a goal of eliminating deaths from malaria by 2015 in Africa, the most-affected continent.
But experts are warning that when families must collect bed nets at a central location, there is a higher possibility of misuse.

By contrast, community health workers or caregivers visiting homes can teach users how to avoid tears in their bed nets so they will last longer.
Through education and example, they help address some of the misunderstandings or social obstacles to routine use of a net.

Jaggers noted an example: "I've seen a local health volunteer working to convince mothers worried about bed bugs that it is actually mosquitoes that pose a deadly threat to their children. With the volunteer's help, those mothers learned to hang bed nets properly rather than use them to seal mattresses from bed bugs."

"A bed net's protectiveness from malarial mosquitoes is limited if it isn't properly used or maintained," said Jaggers. "To have a long-lasting impact, there must also be community-wide coverage."

The Christian humanitarian organisation urges programs fighting malaria to emphasize grassroots, community distributions of bed nets within national and global plans.

A World Vision analysis earlier this year highlighted a marked decrease in the disease when at least 80 per cent of a community's households were covered with insecticide-treated bed nets, and community leaders and volunteers were mobilised to educate, follow up and ensure participation in bed net usage.
In Zambia, thousands of community health volunteers trained by World Vision and others are distributing 133,000 long-lasting insecticidal nets.
It is hoped that the effort will reach out to all in the remote communities, not only those most vulnerable to the disease, such as children under five years and pregnant women.

The workers help instruct recipients on installation, use and maintenance. This universal coverage approach has proven to be highly effective in preventing the disease and related child deaths.

According to the National Malaria Control Centre, malaria is a parasitic disease that is transmitted between humans through the bite of the female Anopheles mosquito.

While there are four types of parasites that can cause malaria in humans, Plasmodium falciparum is by far the most deadly and common, particularly in Zambia and throughout sub-Saharan Africa. Malaria can also result in miscarriage in pregnant women, low birth-weight infants, developmental disabilities, and other complications.
There are positive signs.

In April this year we were informed that, malaria deaths reported from health facilities in Zambia have declined by 66 per cent. This result along with other supporting data indicates that Zambia had reached the 2010 Roll Back Malaria target of a more than 50 per cent reduction in malaria mortality compared to 2000. So, Zambia's efforts are a model for other countries to follow.

The decline in Zambia was especially steep after 3.6 million long-lasting insecticidal nets were distributed between 2006 and 2008. During this period malaria deaths declined 47 per cent and nationwide surveys showed parasite prevalence declined 53 per cent from 21.8 per cent to 10.2 per cent and the percentage of children with severe anaemia declined 68 per cent from 13.3 per cent to 4.3 per cent.

The Ministry of Health of Zambia has since expanded malaria control activities with grants worth US$ 120 million from the Global Fund and support from partners including the President's Malaria Initiative (PMI), the Malaria Control and Evaluation Partnership in Africa (MACEPA) and the World Bank Booster Program for Malaria Control in Africa.

It is only through such aggressive malaria control measures that Zambia can save its dying souls.




Source : www.zambiapost.com