Innovation key to defeating malaria

Our study in Myanmar, funded by President’s Malaria Initiative and UK aid, tested the effectiveness of insecticide treated clothing in reducing mosquito bites compared with untreated clothing. Here, a woman places her covered arm into a mosquito-filled box to see how effectively the treated garment repels mosquitoes.

Our work developing mobile phone applications for community health workers (CHWs) in Uganda and Mozambique has helped them to diagnose patients (pictured above), submit patient data, notify district and national health officials of drug stockouts, and keep in closer contact with other CHWs and supervisors.

We have used mobile technology in other contexts, too. In Cambodia, we piloted a UK aid-funded project that used SMS technology in the private sector to improve referrals and integrate private patient data into the National Malaria Information System. In Uganda, we have sent reminder text messages to health workers to remind them of guidelines on how to provide preventive treatment for malaria to pregnant women.

Simply providing mosquito nets doesn’t guarantee a reduction in malaria cases. People must be willing and able to use them. In Mozambique, we have targeted at-risk groups (such as pregnant women at antenatal care clinics) with nets as well as information on their use, supported the commercial sector to develop a market for nets that make them affordable for all, and have worked to create demand as well as promote proper use of nets through communications activities.

In Nigeria, we promote health messages using a variety of platforms. Our Support to National Malaria Programme (SuNMaP), funded by the UK government, created demand for malaria services through radio jingles, dramas, television commercials, posters and leaflets. The photo above, showing a Lagos bus, is an example of some of the creative methods that we used to spread positive health messages.

Another innovative behaviour change approach that we have implemented in Asia involves the identification and promotion of healthy behaviour already existing within communities. Originally used to improve nutrition outcomes in the 1970s, the ‘positive deviance’ approach identifies role models who can share their everyday health-seeking behaviour with the rest of the community in an attempt to improve overall health. Malaria Consortium is the first organisation to apply this method to malaria control in an elimination context. In this photo, a ‘positive deviant’ volunteer holds a meeting to discuss healthy practices with residents of Kyun Su township in Myanmar.

We have set up community dialogues in Mozambique, Uganda and Zambia to provide a platform for communities to discuss health issues, identify solutions and plan communal action. These dialogues are led by volunteers selected by the communities themselves and have proven to be successful in creating demand for community health services and getting participants to adopt healthy behaviour. 

In Uganda, with funding from Comic Relief, we have supported motorcycle taxi drivers (called boda-bodas) to handle the transport of sick children to health facilities in Mbale district. Community health workers give these drivers vouchers indicating the amount that the health facility should pay the driver depending on the distance travelled.

In partnership with the National Malaria Control Programme (NMCP), and with funding support from the President’s Malaria Initiative, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Three Millennium Development Goal Fund (3MDG), Malaria Consortium led the first national survey for malaria in Myanmar last year. In the photo above, field workers go from house to house to assess gather data on the malaria burden.

In Cambodia, with funding from The Malaria Eradication Scientific Alliance (MESA), we have been working towards elimination by trying to catch every case of malaria. Part of this effort involves going to the households where malaria has been reported (often via text message from village malaria workers) and then screening other household members for malaria.

We are also working in the region to help limit the spread of malaria by setting up border checkpoints to screen migrant workers. If tests come back positive for traces of the malaria parasite, the patient is treated on the spot.

With funding from UNITAID, we are now carrying out distributions of seasonal malaria chemoprevention – an effective method of preventing malaria in children under five – in seven West African countries. Together with our partners, we will have provided 45 million treatments to more than six million vulnerable children by 2017.