Where malaria transmission is seasonal, notably in Africa’s Sahel region, children of all ages most at risk of severe malaria are protected through SMC. This intervention consists of full antimalarial treatment courses of sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine and amodiaquine (SPAQ), administered monthly (28 d...ays) during the high-transmission period (typically the rainy season), generally for up to five months per year. SMC can be deployed relatively easily across a large population and is highly cost-effective at only USD $0.30-0.40/dose,3 making it an important tool for malaria control
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WHO has updated it recommendations for 3 key malaria prevention strategies: seasonal malaria chemoprevention (SMC), perennial malaria chemoprevention (PMC – previously known as intermittent preventive treatment in infants, or IPTi) and intermittent preventive treatment of malaria in pregnancy (IPT...p). When given to the young children and pregnant women who are most vulnerable to malaria, preventive chemotherapy has been shown to be a safe, effective and cost-effective strategy for reducing the disease burden and saving lives.
The updated recommendations on SMC, PMC and IPTp, published today in the WHO Guidelines for malaria, will support the broader use of chemoprevention among young children at high risk of severe malaria in areas with both seasonal and year-round transmission and promote expanded access to preventive chemotherapy in pregnancy.
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This second edition of the Basic Malaria Microscopy package is a stand-alone product,
providing all that is needed to conduct a complete training course
Relapsing malaria caused by Plasmodium vivax parasites poses a significant challenge to global malaria elimination efforts. About one third of the population remains at risk of contracting P. vivax malaria, and 85% of P. vivax infections stem from reactivated latent parasites, leading to chronic ana...emia and increased morbidity and mortality. In addition to diagnostic tools that can detect the acute, blood-stage of P. vivax, new tools are needed to detect the dormant infections before they reactivate and contribute to morbidity and onwards transmission
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Determination of Parasitemia and Lifecycle
Infection and Drug Resistance 2020:13 4047–4060
WHO recommends artemisinin-based combination therapies for treating uncomplicated malaria, alongside studies to monitor treatment effectiveness. Given the threat of antimalarial resistance, including partial resistance in several African countries, molecular tools are vital for tracking resistance. ...In 2015, WHO launched the External Quality Assessment scheme for nucleic acid amplification testing to ensure reliable lab results. Coordinated by WHO and operated by the United Kingdom National External Quality Assessment Service for Parasitology, the scheme provides quality-controlled specimens and reports to help improve testing accuracy. Experts recently discussed expanding the scheme to include antimalarial resistance markers.
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Meeting report, Kampala, Uganda,
7–8 November 2023
Launch of the WHO Report on antimalarial drug efficacy, resistance and response: 10 years of surveillance (2010–2019). Key findings