Ending Malaria in Nigeria for Good

In the past 15 years, Nigeria has made historic progress in turning the tide against malaria. Since 2011, an aggres­sive program to fight malaria in Nigeria reduced mortality rates among children under five by 18 percent, and malaria among this same group declined by a remarkable 15 percent.

 

Although this is impressive, worldwide progress on malar­ia control during this same pe­riod resulted in infection rates dropping globally by 60 percent.

 

As we commemorate World Malaria Day on April 25, we cel­ebrate this success. The Unit­ed States, as the world’s leading donor in global health, remains strongly committed to working with Nigeria and all our part­ners to intensify the efforts to free people from the tremen­dous burden of malaria.

 

Despite Nigeria’s tremendous progress, we must remain com­mitted to our fight against ma­laria. More than 430,000 people around the world still die each year from this preventable and treatable illness. Ninety per­cent of all malaria deaths occur in sub-Saharan Africa. The vast majority are children under five, as malaria kills one of our chil­dren every two minutes. Malar­ia sickens hundreds of millions of people over and over again. More than half of all school ab­sences in Africa are due to ma­laria. The disease costs the con­tinent billions of dollars each year in health costs and lost pro­ductivity. In Nigeria, the Na­tional Malaria Elimination Pro­gram estimates malaria costs the Nigerian economy 132 billion naira ($660 million) annually.

 

I am proud that the U.S. Pres­ident’s Malaria Initiative (PMI) continues to play a key role in the global fight against malaria. PMI, which supports 19 coun­tries in sub-Saharan Africa, provides Nigerian communi­ties and families with a mix of tools to fight malaria, including long-lasting, insecticide-treated mosquito nets, indoor insecti­cide spraying campaigns, the latest drug therapies to treat in­fections, prevention and treat­ment of malaria in pregnancy, and community education cam­paigns. Treated mosquito nets are a highly effective means of preventing infection and reduc­ing malaria transmission.

 

In Nigeria, PMI works with national partners such as the Ministry of Health and the Na­tional Malaria Elimination Pro­gram. PMI also works with in­ternational partners such as the UK Department for Interna­tional Development, the World Health Organization, and the Global Fund to reach and main­tain universal coverage with long-lasting, insecticide-treat­ed nets for all individuals liv­ing in malaria endemic areas. This year alone, PMI will pro­vide 8.7 million nets to families in Nigeria.

 

The United States also sup­ports the Nigerian people by training medical personnel and community health work­ers to care for people with ma­laria. This past year alone, PMI supported training for nearly 7,000 health workers around the world in malaria case manage­ment. PMI also provides the test kits and medicines to help those patients who come to them. In just the past year in Nigeria, PMI procured 19 million anti-malarial treatments and more than 6 million rapid diagnostic tests kits.

 

The most exciting news about malaria is that it can be eradi­cated. To make this happen, we must recognize that we do not need to accept malaria as be­ing a normal part of life. If we sleep inside a treated net every night, if we seek treatment from a qualified health worker with­in 24 hours of the onset of a fe­ver, we can drive down the pres­ence of the malaria parasite in our environment and ultimate­ly eliminate it.

 

Despite our impressive gains, we still have much work to do. We must improve the protec­tion of expecting mothers and their newborns from malaria. During pregnancy, malaria can cause particularly serious, life-threatening risks for both the mother and her baby. Com­mon problems include maternal anemia, miscarriage, prematuri­ty, stillbirth, and low birthweight in newborns.

 

We must increase access to health services, especially for the poor. Community health work­ers must be able to provide re­liable testing and treatment for malaria and other childhood illnesses. We have shown in a number of countries that such services can be scaled up quick­ly and affordably, and that they make a difference.

 

Ending malaria is not just good social policy, it is good business. Leading economists have identified the fight against malaria as one of the “best buys” in global development, estimat­ing that a 50 percent reduction in global malaria incidence could produce over 7,000 nai­ra ($36) in economic benefits for every 200 naira ($1) invest­ed. Malaria eradication could deliver more than four hun­dred trillion naira ($2 trillion) in economic benefits and, more importantly, save an estimated 11 million lives.

 

Success during the next three to five years will be crucial to attain the vision of this year’s World Malaria Day theme, “End Malaria for Good.” Ridding the world of this burden will have a long-term transformative im­pact across the globe, saving millions of lives and generating trillions in additional econom­ic output.

 

I thank my colleagues and counterparts in Nigeria, who fight malaria tirelessly in com­munities every day. If we all continue to pull together, we can rid the world of this dead­ly scourge.