For correspondence:- Email: okhamafe@uniben.edu
Published: 15 June 2004
Citation: Okhamafe AO. Antimalarial interventions in sub-Saharan Africa: myth or reality?. Trop J Pharm Res 2004; 3(1):263-264 doi: 10.4314/tjpr.v3i1.1
© 2004 The authors.
This is an Open Access article that uses a funding model which does not charge readers or their institutions for access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) and the Budapest Open Access Initiative (http://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/read), which permit unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited..
In recognition of the enormous burden of malaria on the continent, African Heads of State and Governments expressed their political will to fight the disease at the Abuja 2000 Malaria Summit. The target set at the Summit was that by 2005 there would be at least 60% reduction in the burden of the disease in the continent. To achieve this, it was agreed that children and pregnant women (the most vulnerable groups) should benefit from the most suitable combination of personal and community protective measures such as insecticide treated bed nets, intermittent preventive therapy and prompt and adequate case management of clinical conditions. These interventions are in line with World Health Organization’s recommendations for malaria endemic regions of the world. While these recommendations and the expressed political will of African leaders are laudable, however, the implementation and applicability of the interventions are of critical concern. Five years after the Summit, a visit to any health care facility in sub-Saharan Africa is all that is needed to convince anyone that not much has been achieved. As a result of this, many African stakeholders have argued that, perhaps, an integrated approach might be the right solution to the malaria situation in the continent.
With a new target set at the United Nations Millennium Development Goals of reducing malaria and other poverty related diseases in Africa by 2015, antimalarial policy planners and implementers in the continent should begin to refocus on integrated approaches. Focusing on measures to reduce the malaria vectors could be the antimalarial intervention that Africans need.
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