Category Archives: Malaria

UK warned that 15% cut to health fund will force ‘impossible choices’ on Africa

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Advocates fear that other donors will follow Britain’s reduction to the Global Fund for Aids, TB and malaria

The UK is undermining its legacy in fighting infectious diseases including Aids and malaria by cutting money pledged to a leading global health fund, campaigners claim.

The 15% reduction in the contribution to the Global Fund for Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria announced this week – in a year when the UK, alongside South Africa, is co-host of the fund’s replenishment drive – risks encouraging other countries to cut back commitments as well, advocates fear.

The Gates Foundation is a major private contributor to the Global Fund. The foundation also contributes to theguardian.org, which funds independent journalism at the Guardian

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Anti-malaria funding cuts could lead to ‘deadliest resurgence ever’, study warns

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Expected reduction in contributions by wealthy countries likely to cost millions of lives and billions in lost growth

Slashed contributions from wealthy countries to an anti-malaria fund could allow a resurgence of the disease, costing millions of lives and billions of pounds by the end of the decade, according to a new analysis.

The fight against malaria faces new threats, including extreme weather and humanitarian crises increasing the number of people exposed, and growing biological resistance to insecticides and drugs, the report warns.

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Trump aid spending freeze halts leading malaria vaccine programme

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Global collaboration with US researchers likely to be set back by years, including on spread of drug-resistant HIV

A flagship programme to create malaria vaccines has been halted by the Trump administration, in just one example of a rippling disruption to health research around the globe since the new US president took power.

The USAid Malaria Vaccine Development Program (MVDP) – which works to prevent child deaths by creating more effective second-generation vaccines – funds research by teams collaborating across institutes, including the US university Johns Hopkins and the UK’s University of Oxford.

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Fears for spread of malaria in Africa as study finds resistance to frontline drug

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Signs of resistance to artemisinin in tenth of children with severe malaria similar to situation in Asia, say researchers

Researchers have found “troubling” evidence for the first time that a lifesaving malaria drug is becoming less effective in young African children with serious infections.

A study of children being treated in hospital for malaria in Uganda, presented at a major conference on Thursday, found signs of resistance to artemisinin in one patient in 10.

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Europe’s medical schools to give more training on diseases linked to climate crisis

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New climate network will teach trainee doctors more about heatstroke, dengue and malaria and role of global warming in health

Mosquito-borne diseases such as dengue and malaria will become a bigger part of the curriculum at medical schools across Europe in the face of the climate crisis.

Future doctors will also have more training on how to recognise and treat heatstroke, and be expected to take the climate impact of treatments such as inhalers for asthma into account, medical school leaders said, announcing the formation of the European Network on Climate & Health Education (Enche).

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Fifth of medicines in Africa may be sub-par or fake, research finds

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Analysis suggests extent of problem UN estimates is causing 500,000 deaths a year in sub-Saharan region

A fifth of medicines in Africa could be substandard or fake, according to a major research project, raising the alarm over a problem that could be contributing to the deaths of countless patients.

Researchers from Bahir Dar University in Ethiopia analysed 27 studies in the review and found, of the 7,508 medicine samples included, 1,639 failed at least one quality test and were confirmed to be substandard or falsified.

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Mosquito-borne diseases spreading in Europe due to climate crisis, says expert

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Illnesses such as dengue and malaria to reach unaffected parts of northern Europe, America, Asia and Australia, conference to hear

Mosquito-borne diseases are spreading across the globe, and particularly in Europe, due to climate breakdown, an expert has said.

The insects spread illnesses such as malaria and dengue fever, the prevalences of which have hugely increased over the past 80 years as global heating has given them the warmer, more humid conditions they thrive in.

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New types of mosquito bed nets could cut malaria risk by up to half, trial finds

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Adding another insecticide to the protective netting has proved effective in fight against the disease that killed 600,000 in 2022

Two new types of mosquito bed nets have been found to reduce cases of malaria by up to a half, raising hopes of combating the disease, which is becoming increasingly resistant to treatments and prevention efforts.

Nets treated with two types of insecticide rather than one were trialled in 17 African countries where malaria is endemic between 2019 and 2022.

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UN warns of ‘epic suffering’ in Sudan and appeals for $4bn in aid

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Ten months of armed conflict in the country has displaced nearly 11 million people and left half the population facing hunger

There is “epic suffering” in Sudan says the UN, where fighting between rival military factions since April has created the world’s biggest internal displacement crisis and raised fears of state failure.

On Wednesday, the UN appealed for $4.1bn (£3. 25bn) to meet humanitarian needs, amid warnings by the UN’s World Food Programme that people are starving to death in areas cut off by fighting.

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World first: malaria vaccine rollout begins in Cameroon

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Another 19 African countries have plans to join the programme – bringing ‘more than just hope’ to a continent that suffers the vast majority of malaria deaths

The rollout of the world’s first malaria vaccine began in Cameroon on Monday, which is said to be a “transformative chapter in Africa’s public health history”.

The RTS,S vaccine – 662,000 doses of it – will be administered to children in the west African country, the first to be vaccinated after successful trials of the drug in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi between 2019 and 2021.

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Cape Verde becomes fourth African country to eliminate malaria

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With no recorded cases since 2017, the archipelago has had a long journey to become free of the disease, which killed 608,000 people globally in 2022

Cape Verde has become the fourth country in Africa and the 44th in the world to eliminate malaria.

Africa has the highest number of cases of the mosquito-borne disease in the world. In 2022, 94% of the 249 million cases globally and 95% of deaths were recorded on the continent.

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Could new malaria drug give babies a better chance of survival?

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Trials are under way for a treatment for newborns and infants, who are often wrongly assumed to have immunity through their mothers

When Rose Akinyi’s baby, Jayla Joy, would not eat or stop crying one night, she thought her newborn had a stomach upset. She gave her some mild pain medication, but her condition grew worse.

“She was burning hot, so I removed her clothes and gave her [more pain medication],” said 30-year-old Akinyi, from Kisumu, a port city in western Kenya on Lake Victoria.

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Climate crisis a ‘substantial risk’ to fight against malaria, says WHO

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New report says disease-carrying mosquitoes thrive in rising temperatures, leading to transmission in hitherto unaffected areas

The climate crisis poses a major threat to the fight against malaria, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), with evidence suggesting extreme weather events and rising temperatures have already led to spikes in cases.

Mosquitoes, the carriers of the disease, thrive in warm, damp and humid conditions, which are increasing with global heating.

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Kenya manufacturer is first in Africa to get WHO approval for malaria drug

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Pre-qualification seen as significant step towards self-sufficiency in healthcare in continent where more than 70% of drugs are imported

A Kenyan pharmaceutical company, Universal Corporation Limited, has become the first manufacturer in Africa to receive World Health Organization (WHO) approval to produce a lifesaving malaria drug.

The antimalarial drug, sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine plus amodiaquine (Spaq), is frequently used to prevent seasonal malaria in children during months of peak transmission periods such as rainy seasons. Previously, demand for drugs such as Spaq in Africa has been met through the importation of generic versions of the medicine from India and China.

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The new malaria vaccine will prevent many deaths – but it’s by no means the end of the disease

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The new R21/Matrix-M vaccine will be far more easily available than the first vaccine – but the reality of life in Africa will blunt its impact

A new vaccine against malaria – which kills 600,000 people every year, mostly children – is to be injected into babies’ arms in 18 countries where the disease is most deadly. That’s joyous news. But the unbridled enthusiasm the announcement has generated says as much about the sorry state of malaria control as the brilliance of scientific invention.

Because this is an imperfect vaccine that at best will protect 75% of those given it. That’s the top figure from the clinical trials. In the reality of village life in poverty-ridden parts of Africa, it may keep fewer than half safe. It’s still hugely important to get vaccination programmes going in the 18 countries that will now be funded to run them, because many deaths will be averted. But it’s not the end of malaria. Nowhere near.

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Eliminate malaria once and for all or it will come back stronger, UN warned

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World faces ‘malaria emergency’ from resistance to insecticides, waning efficacy of drugs, funding shortfalls and climate change

African leaders have warned that the world is facing the “biggest malaria emergency” of the past two decades.

Heads of state and experts came together in a show of unity to call for urgent action on malaria at the UN general assembly on Friday, saying progress on eradicating the disease faced serious setbacks from mosquitoes’ growing resistance to insecticides, and the decreased effectiveness of antimalarial drugs and diagnostic tests.

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‘Safe and effective’: first malaria vaccine to be rolled out in 12 African countries

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An initial 18m doses will be delivered over the next two years to combat a disease that kills nearly half a million children annually

A long-awaited vaccine for malaria has been announced for rollout across 12 African countries over the next two years, potentially saving tens of thousands of lives.

An initial 18m doses of the world’s first malaria vaccine have been assigned to the countries where the risk of children falling ill and dying from malaria is highest, according to a statement from the global vaccine alliance Gavi, the World Health Organization (WHO) and Unicef.

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Ghana is first country to approve Oxford malaria vaccine

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Breakthrough hailed as highly effective R21 vaccine is cleared by west African country but questions remain over funding

Ghana has become the first country to approve a highly effective malaria vaccine developed at Oxford university in the UK.

The R21/Matrix-M vaccine, the first to exceed the World Health Organization’s target of 75% efficacy, has been cleared for use by Ghana’s Food and Drugs Authority in children aged 5-36 months, the group at highest risk of death from malaria.

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Jair Bolsonaro accused of acts of genocide against Amazonian group

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Brazilian president says predecessor emboldened wildcat miners which led to wrecked forests and disease and death among Indigenous people

Brazil’s new president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has accused Jair Bolsonaro’s far-right administration of committing genocide against the Yanomami people of the Amazon, amid public outrage over a humanitarian catastrophe in the country’s largest Indigenous territory.

Lula visited the Amazon state of Roraima on Saturday to denounce the plight of the Yanomami, whose supposedly protected lands have been plunged into crisis by government neglect and the explosion of illegal mining.

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Sudan experiences worst dengue fever outbreak for more than a decade

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Floods caused by warming temperatures and a lack of preventive care are driving the spread of the disease in a country racked with political and economic upheaval

More than 1,400 people in Sudan have been diagnosed with dengue fever this year in the worst outbreak in the country for more than a decade.

Half of the country’s 18 states have registered cases and nine deaths recorded, including one child, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) who suspect the true number to be far higher.

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