Myanmar must boost efforts to eliminate malaria: study
Myanmar needs special strategies to meet its goal of eliminating the mosquito-borne disease malaria by 2030, a recent study has said.
Malaria is a life-threatening disease caused by parasites that are transmitted to people through the bites of infected female anopheles mosquitoes, according to the World Health Organisation. However, it is preventable and curable.
The National Strategic Plan for Malaria Elimination 2016-2030 has a goal to eradicate falciparum malaria by 2025 and all forms of the disease by 2030.
The disease’s most dangerous form, falciparum malaria is responsible for around 50 percent of all malaria cases worldwide, including 405,000 deaths in 2018.
Myanmar signed the Ministerial Call for Action to Eliminate Malaria in the Greater Mekong Subregion Before 2030 at the World Health Assembly in 2018.
In the past seven years in Myanmar, cases have dropped by 85pc and deaths by a stunning 95pc. Almost 4000 people died of malaria in the country in 2010, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates, but the disease claimed just 200 lives in 2017.
In 2018, Myanmar recorded 76,518 malaria cases and a sharp drop in the mortality rate. Nineteen people died of malaria in Myanmar last year, according to the Ministry of Health and Sports.
Hmue Angel
