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Welcome: where we have
been, where we are going
Dr. Kent Campbell, MACEPA Program
Director |
Dear Colleagues,
Welcome to the first edition of MACEPA
News. This e-newsletter aims to keep you current on MACEPA’s work.
Watch for MACEPA News three times a year to include updates on emerging malaria control insights, as well as perspectives from Zambia and
our regional and global partners. Our sincere hope is to stimulate discussion and provide a forum for sharing progress and challenges in malaria
control today.
Looking back, looking ahead. MACEPA, a project at PATH, is reaching an important milestone. The end of our second project year provides an
opportunity to reflect not only on our achievements to date, but importantly, on our lessons learned. It is with these challenges in mind that we
move forward, most immediately gearing up for the malaria transmission season that is about to begin in southern Africa.
Photo David Jacobs
Sleeping under an ITN protects families from malaria. |
Scale up for Impact. MACEPA and Zambia are championing the development of Scale up for Impact (SUFI) for malaria control, a programming
framework that supports rapid national scale-up of proven malaria control interventions. Evidence-based planning and management are central tenets to
the SUFI approach. As part of national scale-up, MACEPA and key partners assisted Zambia in conducting the first-ever nationally-representative malaria indicator survey (MIS), described at the bottom of this newsletter. Zambia is serving
as a regional leader in developing the MIS methodology and sharing it with neighboring country programs.
Our Commitment to Zambia. MACEPA is steadfast in our commitment to supporting Zambia's leadership in its efforts to deliver a very ambitious
malaria control program. We are investing in meaningful and responsive partnerships that promote sustainable national commitment to malaria control.
We at MACEPA are optimistic about the potential for dramatic advances in malaria control programming in Africa and we believe they can happen only
through our collective efforts and dedication. Good progress has been made in Zambia, but there is much work yet to be done. We pledge perseverance
to this extraordinary effort in Zambia, and increasingly with other countries in the region.
We welcome your comments on this newsletter, your questions about our work
to date, and your reflections on the challenges we all face in tackling malaria. Please send us a note at MACEPA@path.org.
My best to all of you,
Carlos C. (Kent) Campbell, MD, MPH
cccampbell@path.org
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Partners’ Voices: highlighting Zambia, regional, and global news and views Dr. Victor Mukonka, Director of Public Health, Zambia Ministry of Health |
Zambia recently
held elections and the final tally is in. With the re-election of President Mwanawasa, we can say with confidence that support for malaria control in
Zambia remains strong at the very highest level. Malaria takes a heavy toll in Zambia and our country has much to gain by halting the disease. It will
allow families, communities, and the country itself to enjoy the benefits inherent to good health, as well as the economic payoffs from having
healthier, more productive citizens.
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With leadership from the National Malaria Control Centre (NMCC),
Zambia is committed to ensuring by December 2008 that:
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Photo David Jacobs
Members of the Bridge Community received ITNs earlier this year. |
Successfully achieving these objectives will enable Zambia to reduce malaria incidence by 75
percent, and deaths due to malaria will be significantly reduced by the end of 2011. Through this reduction, it is anticipated that all-cause
mortality among children under age five will be reduced by 20 percent.
The Ministry of Health in Zambia cannot achieve these goals alone. The Zambia Roll Back
Malaria (RBM) partnership includes government agencies (such as the Ministries of Health, Education, Defense, and Tourism); nongovernmental agencies
(including MACEPA at PATH, Churches Health Association of Zambia, Zambia Malaria Foundation, and Society for Family Health); the private sector
(including Konkola Copper Mines and Mobil Oil Zambia Limited); and donors and multilateral agencies (including the Global Fund to Fight AIDS,
Tuberculosis and Malaria, USAID, the World Bank Booster Program, UNICEF, and the World Health Organization). In addition, commitments at the
community, district, and provincial levels throughout Zambia are essential to this ambitious effort. It is only through the collective efforts of
this strong partnership that we will be successful in achieving our goal of a malaria-free Zambia. |
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MACEPA in Zambia: Country Coordinator’s perspectives
Dr. Abdi Mohamed |
As MACEPA approaches the end of our second year, we have learned and
accomplished much in Zambia. We have established our home office at the National Malaria
Control Centre (NMCC) on the grounds of the Chainama Hills College of Health Sciences in
Lusaka and we are now preparing for our second malaria transmission season. We successfully purchased and distributed 526,000 insecticide-treated
mosquito nets and 500,000 retreatment kits for last year’s malaria season. And importantly, we have nurtured and strengthened our linkages
within the Zambia Roll Back Malaria (RBM) Partnership.
While a strong RBM partnership is central to Zambia’s efforts, I
believe that what is taking place at the district level sets the country apart. Districts are truly stepping up to lead the implementation of the
national plan for scaling up malaria control interventions. District capacity to plan, coordinate, and manage this complex effort has grown
impressively, thus ensuring that residents can protect themselves from malaria and that national targets are met.
Photo David Jacobs
Pregnant women and children are most vulnerable to malaria. |
And unusual partnerships are emerging with Zambia’s leadership. For
instance, In addition to the coordinated efforts of the Churches Health Association of Zambia and the UN High Commission on Refugees to distribute
over 100,000 bednets to rural districts and refugee camps last year, the NMCC partnered
with the armed forces of Zambia to transport over 340,000 nets to the Western and North Western Provinces. This was the first time an African country
engaged its military to play this crucial role in disease prevention and control. With unmatched enthusiasm and commitment to the scale-up effort, the
military carried out this contribution with distinction and has set an example to all partners in the country as well as to their regional
counterparts. Recently, one of the top army officials who coordinated the work informed me that neighboring countries have approached him to learn
more about their unique experience. And Colonel Luwendo, the army’s head of logistics, continues to assure the NMCC that the military is
“at your service anytime you need us.”
This is just one example of the unique nature of Zambia’s national
program. The unprecedented SUFI approach allows all concerned to pull together the needed resources to achieve the national goals and targets. I look
forward to sharing more stories with you in the future, both progress and challenges.
Abdi Mohamed joined our team in January 2006. His previous
post was as a Johns Hopkins University Fellow at USAID, where he was responsible for malaria, tuberculosis, and child survival programming in Zambia.
Abdi is a physician by training and when not working for MACEPA he can be found volunteering in local clinics or running local footraces and
marathons. His updates will be a regular feature in MACEPA News. |
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Vistas: featuring leaders’ voices
Scott Jackson, PATH’s Vice President for External
Relations MACEPA’s efforts in Zambia and beyond truly capture the
essence of partnership that is at the heart of all of PATH’s work. MACEPA and PATH share a commitment to infusing new momentum into
promising solutions to longstanding health problems. |
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"...we believe that malaria control in sub-Saharan Africa is being transformed." |
This is particularly important today: the intellectual, financial, and human resources devoted to global health problems are unprecedented,
and yet it is only by their coming together through genuine, strategic, and committed partnerships that they can result in meaningful solutions. For
MACEPA, this means engaging to form a flexible, multi-sector partnership to collectively press hard against the boundary of what has conventionally
been accepted as the limit to what’s possible to achieve in malaria control. By working in diverse partnerships that take a disciplined,
evidence-based approach, we believe that malaria control in sub-Saharan Africa is being transformed. |
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Feature focus: highlighting what’s new in malaria control
Zambia Malaria Indicator Survey: Innovation Yields Success |
In 2006, Zambia completed the first-ever nationally representative household survey in a malarious
country that combined standard measurement protocols for anemia and malaria parasite prevalence testing with data collection via hand-held
computers. The protocols were developed by the Roll Back Malaria (RBM) Partnership Monitoring and Evaluation Reference Group. This effort, led by
Zambia and in collaboration with MACEPA and many other RBM partners, was designed to provide baseline data critical to measuring progress toward the
ambitious goals and targets set forth in the National Malaria Strategic Plan for 2006-2011.
Photo David Jacobs
Data collection using a PDA.
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The survey findings reveal that only one quarter of Zambian children under age five are
sleeping under nets: clearly this is an area for improvement. On the other hand, in 2006, nearly half of households in Zambia have an
insecticide-treated net: this is double from findings from another study three years ago. And, more than sixty percent of pregnant women took at
least two of the recommended three doses of preventive medicine, Fansidar, during their last pregnancy: a positive indicator at this early stage of
implementation.
The survey provides an important benchmark for successfully measuring progress in scaling up malaria interventions. As future surveys are conducted periodically, this benchmark will provide evidence
of impact and inform our efforts to conquer malaria in Zambia.
Read more
about the survey Access the full report (859 KB
PDF) |
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MACEPA Lusaka
Postal Net Box 370
P/Bag E 10, Lusaka, Zambia
macepa@path.org |
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