Call to increase efforts against malaria

The World Health Organisation (WHO) and Unicef have called for an urgent increase in effort to roll back malaria, which is now killing more than 3,000 children in Africa every day.

In the recently published Africa Malaria Report it also stresses that the latest effective antimalarial drugs are not yet accessible to the majority of those who need them and that only a small proportion of children at risk are protected by highly effective insecticide-treated nets (ITNs).

The report urges the following measures:

• Increasing global investment to support programmes to control malaria in endemic countries;

• According higher priority to malaria on the health agenda of endemic countries;

• Encouraging greater private sector involvement in the national supply and distribution of quality antimalarial drugs, and ITNs;

• Ensuring the availability of the new generation of highly effective antimalarial combination drug treatments to populations at risk.

The Africa Malaria Report acknowledges the contribution of global efforts to the substantial progress already made by a number of countries that have adopted cost effective strategies to fight the disease with greater focus on the most vulnerable - women and young children. But according to Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland, WHO director-general, 'Malaria continues to tighten its grip on Africa. By scaling up our efforts, we can reverse this trend.'

Meanwhile Swiss drug company Novartis, in collaboration with the WHO, has launched an international education programme to ensure effective treatment with its fixed dose combination anti-malarial drug product, consisting of artemether and lumefantrine (Coartem). Many patients in developing countries have difficulty reading conventional Western style packaging, which can lead to the inappropriate use of anti-malarial drugs, poor cure rates and avoidable deaths.

The 'Coartem and Malaria' education programme supports Novartis's novel product packaging, which has been specially designed to improve patient compliance in developing countries, optimising drug response and cure rates. The innovative packaging incorporates a series of simple visual images that depict correct use of the six-dose regimen for infants, children and adults. Both the packaging and educational programme have undergone intensive field testing.