Impact on malaria morbidity of a programme supplying insecticide treated nets in children aged under 2 years in Tanzania: community cross sectional study
Mosquito nets treated with insecticide and distributed as part of a large scale social marketing programme can substantially reduce the prevalence of malaria and anaemia in very young children in Tanzania, finds a study in this week's BMJ. This strategy has high potential in the control of malaria in sub-Saharan Africa, say the authors.
Abdulla and colleagues investigated a random sample of 748 children, aged under 2 years, living in 18 villages in southwest Tanzania. The first survey was done at the time of launching the social marketing campaign (June 1997), and two other surveys were carried out at the same period (June to August) in the subsequent two years. They found that ownership of treated nets rose rapidly, from 10% to 61%. The prevalence of severe anaemia decreased from 49% to 26% in the two years studied, and the mean Haemoglobin level in the children rose from 80g/l to 89 g/l. Treated nets had a protective efficacy of 63% against both malaria and anaemia.
Treated mosquito nets might therefore be able to deliver feasible and effective malaria prevention on a large scale in areas where malaria is highly endemic, conclude the authors.
Contacts:
Dr Christian Lengeler, Project Leader, Swiss Tropical Institute, Basle, Switzerland Email: Christian.Lengeler@unibas.ch
Dr Salim Abdulla, Ifakara Health Research and Development Center, Ifakara, Tanzania, Email: Email: ihrdc@twiga.com