Dear HIFA colleagues,
Happy New Year!
WHO news release and comment from me below.
--
Equitable access to life-saving malaria tools is key to reversing trends
11 December 2024 News release Geneva Reading time: 3 min (755 words)
New data from the World Health Organization (WHO) reveal that an estimated 2.2 billion cases of malaria and 12.7 million deaths have been averted since 2000, but the disease remains a serious global health threat, particularly in the WHO African Region.
According to WHO’s latest World malaria report, there were an estimated 263 million cases and 597 000 malaria deaths worldwide in 2023. This represents about 11 million more cases in 2023 compared to 2022, and nearly the same number of deaths. Approximately 95% of the deaths occurred in the WHO African Region, where many at risk still lack access to the services they need to prevent, detect and treat the disease.
“No one should die of malaria; yet the disease continues to disproportionately harm people living in the African region, especially young children and pregnant women,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “An expanded package of lifesaving tools now offers better protection against the disease, but stepped-up investments and action in high-burden African countries are needed to curb the threat.” [...]
--
COMMENT (NPW): As well as prevention it is vital that all cases of malaria are referred promptly for diagnosis and treatment by a health worker. Delay in seeking treatment is a major contributing factor to deaths, particularly in children. Previous research showed that '7 in 10 children with malaria treated at home are mismanaged, contributing to 2000 deaths every day in Africa alone' (Mozumder P & Marathe A. Role of information and communication networks in malaria survival. Malaria Journal 2007;6:136). https://www.hifa.org/about-hifa/why-hifa-needed This paper is now quite old and it would be helpful to have updated statistics that relate to informed decision-making by parents and frontline health workers.
A thematic exploration of the information needs of parents could be useful to understand better the deadly delays in seeking care for children with malaria, and how to reduce them.
Best wishes, Neil
HIFA profile: Neil Pakenham-Walsh is coordinator of HIFA (Healthcare Information For All), a global health community that brings all stakeholders together around the shared goal of universal access to reliable healthcare information. HIFA has 20,000 members in 180 countries, interacting in four languages and representing all parts of the global evidence ecosystem. HIFA is administered by Global Healthcare Information Network, a UK-based nonprofit in official relations with the World Health Organization. Email: neil@hifa.org
