Malaria cases increasing in the region

The number of people being infected with malaria is rising in the Southern African region, placing millions of lives at risk. A recent report by UN’s World Health Organisation (WHO) Malaria Department in Harare Zimbabwe, said that there were signs of an overall increase in malaria transmission in the region. The number of cases in Zimbabwe rose from 177,195 by the end of February last year, to 185,026 by the end of February this year. Botswana also saw an increase in the number of reported malaria cases from 8,142 by the end of January last year, to 8,867 by the end of January this year. South Africa is the only country in the region where there has been a decline in the number of malaria cases. By the end of February 1998 there were 4,021 cases, by the end of February this year this had dropped to 3,826 people. Malaria is one of the main health care problems in Africa, with an estimated 550 million people at risk of contracting the disease. Each year between 270 and 480 million people contract malaria and it is estimated that between 1.5 and 2.7 million people die annually from the disease. One of the major difficulties confronting health care workers is that the malaria parasite has developed a resistance to some of the anti-malaria drugs, hindering effective medical treatment. WHO plans to launch a new initiative later this year, the African Initiative for Malaria Control in the 21st century (AIM), to help combat the spread of the disease on the African continent. The initiative will be implemented in phases and it is expected to reduce the number of cases and deaths by at least 50 percent by the year 2010.