World Malaria Day

Today is World Malaria Day 2008. To mark the event in Angola, health officials and UN officials are in Luena City, in eastern Moxico Province, to “inaugurate a fair of products and medicines to fight malaria, as well as launch the campaign of insecticide spraying inside houses in the Sacassange village (14 kilometres south of Luena City)”, according to the Angola Press Agency. Read more here: http://allafrica.com/stories/200804250390.html

Today, Angola’s Health Minister also announced the government’s plans to reduce the malaria mortality rate from 30,000 (recorded in 2003) to less than 8,000 this year. 2000 deaths caused by malaria have been recorded this year. The Minister said mortality rates have dropped in 2008 and pointed to malaria prevention awareness campaigns using mosquito nets as contributing to the decline. Read more here: http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gBlSHk58CxMNZpwbODJeaxfhhj9Q .

The Roll Back Malaria consortium organized the Zambezi Expedition to highlight the World Malaria Day’s year long slogan: ‘Malaria- a disease without borders’. We’ve been following its progress- particularly as the expedition launched from Angola’s Moxico province three weeks ago. Today the expedition arrived in Livingstone, Zambia. The expedition is the first stage in the RBM calls a regional malaria control initiative – the “Trans-Zambezi project”. The RBM says the project will boost health, tourism and economic development in the Trans-Zambezi region. More here: http://www.zambezi-expedition.org/