USAID Pursues Combination Treatment, Combined with Prevention to Turn the Tide Against Malaria

With drug-resistant malaria on the rise and substantial gaps in malaria control remaining, USAID is aggressively supporting a combination of insecticide-treated mosquito nets linked with access to effective antimalarial drugs to save the most lives.

Worldwide, malaria kills two million people each year, making it the world's third deadliest infectious disease, after AIDS and tuberculosis.

But malaria -- spread by mosquitoes -- is the most common of the three diseases, infecting some 300 to 500 million people annually. AIDS and tuberculosis infect 5.3 million and 8.8 million, respectively, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Ninety percent of malaria deaths occur in Africa and the disease primarily affects children under 5 years of age and pregnant women.

"As we consider the plight of those who face this deadly disease, we must act rapidly act with the most effective methods of prevention and treatment" said Dr. E Anne Peterson, Assistant Administrator, Bureau for Global Health. "We must continue to respond to rising expectations for health care and find the best treatment available for all."

The most effective antimalarial treatment now available is a combination of a rapid-acting artemisinin drug and another antimalarial drug. Evidence suggests that this combination therapy, if taken promptly and correctly, could reduce malaria deaths by half and the chronic debilitation of lingering un-cured infection by even more.

Since 1998, USAID has aggressively supported the development of the combination therapy as a safe and effective alternative treatment when chloroquine or other antimalarial drugs are ineffective. In addition, the agency and its global partners in the Roll Back Malaria Partnership are working to ensure sustained financing of the drugs. The Global Fund has committed more than US $$ 30 million over five years for the purchase of artemisinin-based combination therapy, enabling 22 million treatments in total.

Although indoor spraying with DDT continues to be a very effective means of reducing malaria transmission and is widely used in southern Africa, it requires substantial public sector infrastructure to implement effectively. Studies have shown that insecticide-treated mosquito nets alone reduce overall child mortality by as much as 25-30% and greatly reduce the transmission of the infection from mosquito to child - fewer infected bites means; fewer episodes of acute malarial illness. And new technologies now provide long-lasting nets and treatments that remove the necessity for frequent re-treatment. Use of these nets. ITNs alone could save up to one million lives each year in Africa.

USAID is also supporting the development of a malaria vaccine that is being field tested in Kenya and Mali where the disease disables or kills hundreds of thousands of people each year.

This year USAID has committed just over $80 million for malaria programs. This represents nearly a four-fold increase in malaria funding since 1998.