“Free Africa from Malaria Now – Roll Back Malaria”
Leadership and Partnership for Results
The declaration of African Heads of State in Abuja, Nigeria in April 2000, designated April 25 of each year as African Malaria Day. This important day has been observed yearly to provide renewed directions and scale up efforts in the fight against malaria. This commemorative event has been successful as an advocacy tool, due to the support of national governments, multilateral and bilateral organizations, NGOs, the civil society, private sector, communities and the media.
Malaria is a global and complex public health problem that affects mostly children, pregnant women and the poor in Africa. It is sad to report that in 2007:
- Malaria is the leading cause of death for children under the age of five in Africa, one of whom dies every 30 seconds;
- More than 1 million cases of malaria each year result in death;
- Malaria-related illness and mortality cost Africa’s economy approximately US$ 12 billion every year.
All this perpetuates a vicious cycle of poverty and disease.
It is encouraging to report that since 2000, when African leaders met to declare the need to intensify the fight against Malaria, there have been heightened efforts at international, regional, country and community levels to win the fight against this scourge.
The Malaria Day message for 2007 is:
“Free Africa from Malaria Now—Roll Back Malaria—Leadership and Partnership for Results”.
This message acknowledges the success made and identifies the need for continuous leadership and stronger partnership in order to fully defeat malaria. The key message this year reminds us that malaria is preventable and curable: with sustained efforts, we can collectively free Africa of the burden of malaria.
The African Regional Health Report, 2006, describes the linkages between poverty, health and development. While we acknowledge the challenges facing Africa’s health system in meeting the needs of populations, we stress that knowledge, political will, partner interest and some resources exists now in the fight against Africa’s major diseases, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
What is needed now is to translate the commitment, leadership and partnership into actions to scale up provision of health services to Africa’s populations.
The African Union Head of States and Governments Special Summit on HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria held in Abuja, Nigeria, in May 2006, called for universal access to HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria services in order to make significant impact in the fight against the three diseases.
It is important to note that this effort of our governments is supported by international partnership. For example, funding for malaria control has increased tenfold since 2000 thanks to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, the US President’s Malaria Initiative, the World Bank, and new efforts by donors such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
More than 76 million insecticide-treated bednets were procured by Roll Back Malaria partners in
2006, and the Global Fund alone delivered 18 million nets. The number of doses of ACTs procured in 2006 exceeded 100 million, doubling that of the previous year. New easy-to-use and cheaper ACT formulations are being developed and adopted by national programmes. With the support of WHO, national authorities and other technical partners, there is improvement in national planning, coordination and availability of technical support at national, district and community levels.
To intensify the fight against malaria, it is imperative that we continue to collectively support countries in malaria control and elimination. Every child under five and every pregnant woman should sleep under an insecticide-treated net. Where feasible, homes should be sprayed with effective insecticides. Everyone infected by malaria should receive timely treatment with antimalarials such as artemisinin-based combination therapy. Every pregnant woman should have access to preventive treatment to protect herself and her unborn child. We are advocating for these tested methods to be scaled up through international and community level leadership and progressive partnerships. This will ensure that poor people, the most affected, are free from malaria.
We encourage all partners and stakeholders in malaria control to review our common achievements and to renew efforts to win the fight against malaria.
Thank you.