THE Southern Africa Region Network (SARN) has scaled up efforts to combat malaria in the Sadc region after the Global Fund availed $24 million for anti-malaria programmes. RUTH NGWENYA OWN CORRESPONDENT
This was revealed at a two-day meeting in Victoria Falls to come up with a proposal for the Global Fund availed to it as it rolls out programmes aimed at eliminating malaria by 2030.
SARN’s membership is drawn from eight countries Zimbabwe, Angola, Botswana, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland and Zambia and its objective is to reduce malaria related mortality.
SARN links its member states and implements regional activities like sharing of information on ways of dealing with malaria, which is one of the leading killer diseases on the continent.
Colonel Kaka Mudambo, the SARN regional coordinato, said: “We are working on budget proposals for us to attain $24 million from the Global Fund. Malaria rates in Africa have decreased with some countries recording zero prevalence. With this, we believe that our goal of eliminating malaria by 2030 is possible.”
Mudambo said most malaria infected areas were along border posts adding that measures were being put in place to curb the disease and suggested that billboards be erected at border posts to educate people on malaria care.
“Our greatest challenge is people moving from one place to another carrying the malaria parasite, but we are not sure of the exact number of travellers.
“There is also a challenge of access to health care or malaria care. Migrants face challenges of accessing health services when they get to foreign countries sometimes due to discrimination whereby local policies will not be allowing foreigners to access free malaria treatment.”
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Most Sadc countries, including Zimbabwe, give mosquito nets to residents in malaria prone areas and households are sprayed to eliminate mosquitos.
“SARN gets involved in malaria control for a specific country only if we realise that the local government is failing to sponsor the programme,” said Mundambo.
Victoria Falls town council director of housing and community services Lot Mumpande said: “We are facing challenges with this programme as some residents refuse to let their houses get sprayed. I believe it is not a matter of not being educated about the programme because we send community workers to educate the residents at an individual level before we start spraying.”
