16/8/2025–|Last update: 18:42 (Mecca time)
A new medical report, which some health programs in African countries and continental organizations participated in preparing, indicated that young children have become very vulnerable to malaria in the countries of the continent with the arrival of the rainy season and the multiplication of mosquitoes in stagnant water.
The report said that the World Health Organization estimated the deaths of malaria with 600,000 people in the continent of Africa, and indicated that 4 out of 5 deaths are children under the age of five.
The officials, who participated in the preparation of the report, expressed their concern about the large and surprising discounts in financing the anti -malaria resulting from the changes of American policy, noting that with the rain season approaching and the start of planning for prevention campaigns, time is running out to find alternative financing solutions.
Prevention first
The prevention of seasonal malaria is an essential intervention to protect young children from the disease, and has been recommended by the World Health Organization since 2012 to reduce the high death and injuries.
The strategy, which was developed by the World Health Organization based on chemical protection, contributed to a significant reduction that hospitals are no longer burdened with huge numbers of malaria patients.
In addition, chemical protection is relatively low, with a cost of 4 doses for one child between 4 and 6 dollars annually, and provided millions of dollars on families and health systems.
In 2021, an analysis showed that 7 countries applied the chemical protection program and provided its health systems about 66 million dollars, and economic productivity increased by about 43 million.
But the writers, who took over the report, see that any interruption of campaigns, even for one season, may lead to a significant increase in injuries and deaths, and heavy economic losses.
Reflexes on the Sahel region
At the recent meeting in the Togo State of the members of the Malaria Control Alliance, fears were raised about the inability to carry out any campaign during the current season due to a lack of financing to provide security priorities in the region.
These fears and challenges are more prominent in the desert and the coast in West Africa, where the residents live away from medical facilities, while governments suffer from a lack of health workers.
Regarding the alternative plans for chemotherapy, the writers suggested adopting the continuous treatment that is currently obtained by less than 4 million children out of 35 million in the continent of Africa.
Experiments conducted in Mali and Burkina Faso showed that the combination of prevention and treatment tools has a significant impact in protecting children, especially in remote geographical areas.
Calls to move
The report sent an urgent invitation to African governments, the local private sector, and international donors to give priority to preventing malaria and accelerating efforts to eliminate it.
A new course is scheduled to mobilize the resources of the Global Fund for AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria next October, and observers believe that it is necessary to increase its resources to return to the effectiveness after years of staging efforts to eliminate the disease due to lack of funding.
(Tagstotranslate) News (T) Africa (T) Mali