WHO Applauds India’s battle against Malaria

WHO states that "impressive gains" made by India in the fight against malaria, with reductions of 18 percent and 20 percent cases and deaths, respectively from the last 2 years

India made "strong progress" in the fight against malaria, reports of malaria cases in South-East Asia have largely capped from 20 million in 2000 to about 5.6 million last year, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said. WHO noticed that the "impressive gains" in the fight against malaria by India especially in South-East Asia, reduction in cases and deaths of 18 per cent and 20 per cent over the last 2 years respectively. India also recorded a malaria decrease in the number of deaths from the last 9 years. Deaths due to malaria came down from about 29,500 in 2000 to about 7700 in last year in India, the report said, whereas, malaria cases globally about 229 million in 2019, an annual estimate that has remained virtually the same over the last 4 years. Last year, the disease claimed about 409,000 lives, compared to 411,000 in 2018  the World Malaria Report 2020 said on Monday.

The World Health Organization on Monday called for a step up globally and give a strength to fight against malaria, a preventable and curable disease that continues to claim hundreds of thousands of lives each year, notice that progress against the disease is beginning to flatten during COVID-19 pandemic, Gaps in access to life-saving tools undermine global efforts to curb the disease, and the COVID-19 poses is expected to set back the fight even further. Better interventions for the disease, new tools and increased funding are needed to change the global scenario of the disease and reach internationally-agreed targets. The report noted that the 11 highest-burden countries in the world include Burkina Faso, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ghana, India, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Uganda and also the United Republic of Tanzania for the cases of fight against the malaria . 70 percent of malaria cases of the estimated load and 71 percent estimated deaths due to malaria disease globally, many people suffered for the same. 

WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Ghebreyesus said, “It is time for leaders across Africa – and the world – to rise once again to the challenge of malaria, just as they did when they laid the foundation for the progress made since the beginning of this century”.