Spraying campaign under way to combat malaria

A seasonal spraying campaign to pre-empt a possible outbreak of malaria after the main season rains end in September, was nearing completion, a local health expert told IRIN on Thursday. The indoor spraying campaign - part of the national vector-borne disease control programme - was mounted annually in June and July in an effort to control the number of breeding mosquitoes in the country’s malaria-prone lowlands, the expert said. Malaria poses a major health threat to the estimated 50 percent of Ethiopia’s population who live at an altitude of below 2,000 metres and, according to official statistics, accounts for 6 percent of all in-patient consultations. Epidemics frequently occurred following the end of the main rains, when the prevalence of standing water combined with warmer weather provided ideal breeding conditions for the anopheles mosquito, the expert told IRIN. A WHO report in 1999 said the incidence of malaria in Ethiopia had shown a dramatic increase over the past decade, with major epidemics often associated with the occurrence of El Niño events. The increasing incidence of the more virulent falciparum malaria, which was encroaching on higher altitude areas, coupled with its growing resistance to traditional drug therapy, had caused levels of mortality and morbidity to rise in recent years, especially among young children and the elderly, who were considered to be especially at risk, the expert said. The emphasis in Ethiopia was on community-based control strategies, and the implementation of the global “Roll Back Malaria” initiative, supported within the UN by WHO, UNICEF, UNDP and the World Bank, the expert told IRIN. The spraying campaign - an essential component of this approach - was aimed at killing the adult mosquito in people’s homes, where it was most commonly found resting, he said. The “indoor residual spraying” programme is complemented by community-led efforts to destroy mosquito breeding places, and raise awareness of methods to combat malaria, such as the use of insecticide-treated bed-nets. Community health workers were also being trained to recognise the symptoms of malaria early and, with the spread of chloroquine-resistant malaria, two years ago the government had introduced the second-line drug, sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (Fansidar), for the treatment of cases, the health expert said. According to WHO, the community approach to combating malaria in Ethiopia has had a positive impact, with a 40 percent reduction in death rates among children under-five years of age reported from the northern region of Tigray.