Cuban doctors on malaria assessment mission

A four-man team of doctors from Cuba has arrived in The Gambia to assess its Malaria Control Programme, the head of the programme, Marno Jawla, said on Friday. The team, which is due to spend 45 days in The Gambia, will visit various sites in the country where the programme is being implemented, Jawla told IRIN. "They want to see what we are doing, how we do it and possibly discuss with us and also learn from us. They are on a study tour," he said. Since 1995, Jawla said, hundreds of Cuban health practitioners have worked in The Gambia's health system at various levels, from major hospitals to villages. "They often stay only for two years and then go back home," Jawla said, adding that some of those who came for the malaria programme had not seen malaria patients before since Cuba is free of the disease. Malaria is the main killer in The Gambia, he said. According to UNDP's Human Development Report 2001, the country recorded 27,369 cases per 100,000 people in 1997.