Countries Move Toward Sustainable Strategies in Malaria Reduction
The DDT Molecule, www.worldofmolecules.com
Today we’d like to announce the publication of Himali Weerahandi’s artice on the Indian Comprehensive Rural Health Project, an effort to improve rural healthcare in the country by involving local village women. Read it here.
We’d also like to announce that the Australian Medical Students Association (AMSA) Global Health Conference will be held in Brisbane from tomorrow onwards. The conference will attract students from Australia, New Zealand and the Asia-Pacific region who share an interest and passion for global heath and the desire to be involved in improving the health outcomes of population in their local, national and global communities. An academic program reflecting the core challenges and issues pertaining to global health will be complemented by an enticing social program, seeking to capture the spirit of cultural diversity in Australia and around the world. We look forward to hearing all about it in AMSA’s conference report – check it out next week.
Meanwhile, today’s blog is on the efforts to combat the use of DDT to fight malaria.
The international community has labelled DDT as one of what the WHO describe as a ‘dirty dozen’ of organic pollutants
The World Health organization (WHO) and UN Environments Programme (UNEP) have announced that they are working with the Global Environment Facility on an international effort to find sustainable alternatives to the synthetic pesticide DDT in combating the spread of malaria. A mainstay of the WHO’s anti-malaria campaigns in the 1950s and 1960s, DDT is increasingly being seen as a solution “rooted in the scientific knowledge and simplistic options of a previous age”, according to UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner.
The WHO strategy of Integrated Vector Management (IVM) aims to go some way to providing a modern, sustainable solution to the problem. Five-year programmes aimed at reducing malaria incidence without the use of DDT have been successfully piloted in Mexico and Central America, where pesticide-free management techniques have succeeded in reducing the malaria caseload by over 60%. Strategies aimed at reducing contact between mosquitoes and people such as treated bed nets and screening windows and doors, control of mosquito breeding sites, and the introduction of biological control methods such as fish that eat mosquito larvae are set to be tested in 40 countries in Africa, the eastern Mediterranean and central Asia. The framework provided by IVM allows pesticide-free malaria reduction strategies to be delivered in a manner that adapts to suit the local circumstances. Rapid diagnosis and treatment of malaria cases will also be used to destroy the parasites in human populations.
The effort aims to cut DDT use worldwide by 30% before 2014, with the long-term goal of phasing it out altogether by the early 2020s. The international community has labelled DDT as one of what the WHO describe as a ‘dirty dozen’ of organic pollutants, and cite environmental and public health concerns in seeking to ban its use altogether. A limited exemption has been granted to DDT, however, due to its vital role in preventing the spread of malaria. Despite widespread evidence that DDT is dangerous both to humans and to the environment, and the growing numbers of mosquitoes that are developing resistance to the pesticide, situations still arise where it is the only effective way to curtail the spread of malaria, leaving international agencies facing, in the words of WHO Director-General Dr. Margaret Chan, a “double challenge”. With nearly 250 million malaria cases a year, of which over 880,000 prove fatal, concern about the risks associated with DDT use clearly cannot be allowed to take precedence over concern over the global burden of malaria.