Missouriwatcher
Editor, Senior Moderator
According to the World Health Organization, in 2010, malaria caused an estimated 216 million illnesses and 655,000 deaths, mostly children under 5 years in Africa. These numbers represent a 17% decrease in malaria cases and a 25% reduction in deaths worldwide since 2000.
In the early 2000's, funding for malaria efforts in Africa began to increase dramatically. These unprecedented resources have led to a massive scale-up of lifesaving malaria prevention and control interventions, with hundreds of thousands of people receiving insecticide-treated bed nets and effective medicines to treat malaria. These simple, inexpensive interventions have been able to reduce malaria's burden by as much as 50% in some countries...
World Malaria Day is commemorated each April 25, and it provides an opportunity to reflect on the status of global efforts to "roll back malaria." This year's theme, "Sustain Gains, Save Lives: Invest in Malaria," is a reminder of the recent successes in saving lives and a call to continue malaria prevention and control efforts so that these gains will not be reversed.
In the last 20 years, CDC has helped develop and test the tools that make up the effective intervention package now being used in global efforts worldwide: insecticide-treated bed nets and house-spraying to protect families from mosquitoes, accurate diagnostic tests and high-quality effective drugs, and treatment for pregnant women so that they are protected and their babies are born healthy.
New treatment medicines, vaccines, diagnostic tests, and mosquito control products may soon be available, and CDC has begun to develop effective strategies for using and evaluating them, making sure we invest wisely. We are also boosting our efforts to monitor and evaluate approaches to resistance to drugs and insecticides, as well as investigating new ways to collect the strategic information needed to track progress in the fight against malaria.
In the U.S, malaria was eliminated by the early 1950s, but about 1,500 travelers returning to the U.S. each year bring back "imported malaria." If travelers will be visiting an area with malaria transmission, they should be sure to take precautions.
http://www.cdc.gov/Features/WorldMalariaDay/
In the early 2000's, funding for malaria efforts in Africa began to increase dramatically. These unprecedented resources have led to a massive scale-up of lifesaving malaria prevention and control interventions, with hundreds of thousands of people receiving insecticide-treated bed nets and effective medicines to treat malaria. These simple, inexpensive interventions have been able to reduce malaria's burden by as much as 50% in some countries...
World Malaria Day is commemorated each April 25, and it provides an opportunity to reflect on the status of global efforts to "roll back malaria." This year's theme, "Sustain Gains, Save Lives: Invest in Malaria," is a reminder of the recent successes in saving lives and a call to continue malaria prevention and control efforts so that these gains will not be reversed.
In the last 20 years, CDC has helped develop and test the tools that make up the effective intervention package now being used in global efforts worldwide: insecticide-treated bed nets and house-spraying to protect families from mosquitoes, accurate diagnostic tests and high-quality effective drugs, and treatment for pregnant women so that they are protected and their babies are born healthy.
New treatment medicines, vaccines, diagnostic tests, and mosquito control products may soon be available, and CDC has begun to develop effective strategies for using and evaluating them, making sure we invest wisely. We are also boosting our efforts to monitor and evaluate approaches to resistance to drugs and insecticides, as well as investigating new ways to collect the strategic information needed to track progress in the fight against malaria.
In the U.S, malaria was eliminated by the early 1950s, but about 1,500 travelers returning to the U.S. each year bring back "imported malaria." If travelers will be visiting an area with malaria transmission, they should be sure to take precautions.
http://www.cdc.gov/Features/WorldMalariaDay/