Among the 429,000 people who die of malaria each year, 70% are children under the age of five.
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On Monday, April 30 Rotarians Against Malaria (RAM) will raise awareness about the disease and Rotary’s aim to eliminate Malaria.
One child dies from malaria, somewhere in the world, every two minutes.
Currently, 212 million new cases of malaria are reported each year.
However, the better news is that malaria control measures have reduced annual death rates by 60% since 2000 and reduced the number of cases by 37% worldwide.
This means that an estimated six million child deaths have been averted, while steady progress is being made towards the goal of eliminating malaria by the year 2040.
Rotary is providing timely support to assist Timor Leste to eliminate malaria by 2022, to drive the incidence rate down to zero and keep it there for the three years required to be certified malaria free by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
RAM has been supporting malaria control programs in Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and Timor Leste since 1995 by providing insecticidal bed nets, practical support on the ground and education.
Since 2009 RAM in has collaborated with the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, the latter by the distribution of 10 million treated bed nets, sufficient for every household in the country to receive at least two allocations.
RAM is also supporting programs by researching and teaching ways to drive the incidence down to zero and eliminate malaria island by island from our region.
One of these initiatives is to fund the next stage of human trials of a promising malaria vaccine being developed by scientists in the Institute for Glycomics within Griffith University on the Gold Coast. If the vaccine meets expectations, the next phase will be much larger scale human testing in an endemic country such as PNG.
A second Rotary initiative is the sponsoring of a PhD research ‘vector control’ project aimed at determining movement patterns and methods of limiting access to villagers’ huts in the Solomon Island. This research at James Cook University is near completion.
Southern Highlanders can help Rotary in this project by funding elements of the project.
$10 will buy a treated bed net, protect a family, a five-year-old child or a pregnant woman.
$1000 will provide bed nets for a small village, and multiples for larger villages,
$2000 will fund the in-country purchase of hand tools and equipment to assist in eradication, removal of dormant water and improving village cleanliness.
To make a donation visit www.ramaustralia.org, and click on the ‘donate now’ button. Or for more information, email rameastern@rawcs.org.au.