Gains in fighting malaria in Sub-Saharan Africa have left the highest risk for the disease concentrated in 10 countries, according to a study published on Wednesday by The Lancet medical journal.
Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda,
Cote d’Ivoire, Mozambique, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Mali, Guinea and Togo
together account for 87 per cent of areas that have the highest
prevalence of malaria, it said.
The study assessed the effectiveness of the battle
against malaria, which went into higher gear with the launch of the
Roll Back Malaria initiative in 2000.
Since then, financial support has risen from $100 million (73 million euros) annually to about $2 billion (1.46 billion euros).
The researchers drew up a map of the changing face
of malaria from thousands of surveys of prevalence of the disease among
children in 44 countries.
They set down three categories of risk: high,
meaning places where more than 50 per cent of the population were likely
to be infected by the Plasmodium falciparum parasite; moderate (10 to
50 per cent of the population infected); and low (less than 10 per
cent).
From 2000 to 2010, the number of people living in
areas of high-risk infection fell from 219 million to 184 million, a
decline of 16 per cent.
But the numbers living in moderate-risk locations rose from 179 million to 280 million, a rise of 57 per cent.
The good news was that the tally of people living in low-risk areas rose from 131 million to 219 million.
‘Elite club’
Four countries -- Cape Verde, Eritrea, South
Africa and Ethiopia -- joined Swaziland, Djibouti and Mayotte in the
elite club of countries where transmission levels are so low that
elimination of malaria is a realistic goal. (AFP)
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