Borno, World Bank finalize 10 years malaria interventions scale up credit lifeline

Borno State Government has finalized a 10-year scale up of all malaria interventions across the state through a soft credit support from the World Bank.

Addressing a press conference on Sunday to mark the 2021 World Malaria Day, the Borno State Commissioner for Health and Human Services, who is also the Chief of Staff to the Governor Babagana Zulum, Prof. Isa Marte said the plan would be effective this year.

He disclosed that from 2017 to 2020, 1,071,902 persons were confirmed to have suffered malaria attack with 951 death recorded.

He said: “In Borno State, persons confirmed of Malaria in 2020 stood at 359,366 with 370 death, figure for 2019 was 330,587 with 240 death, 2018 was 237,971 with 110 and 2017 was 143,978 with 231 death (-DHIS2 routine data).

“These figures show that, although there has been upward trend of cases from 2017 to 2020, its likely due to improvement in reporting system and training on HMIS version 2019 data tools to M&E officers at all levels across the state in recent years. However, a downward trend in death can also be observed which could be attributed to improvement in early diagnosis and prompt treatment of malaria cases across the state.”

He acknowledged the immense contribution of the World Health Organisation (WHO), UNICEF, MSF, INTERSOS, Mentor Initiative, and other implementing partners, noting that through their robust support lives have been saved.

Marte said with the theme of this years’ commemoration: “Zero Malaria Draw -the line against Malaria”, and the slogan/ “Stand up – take Action”, we must voice out our commitment to the achievement of a malaria-free Nigeria and action must be taken so that we can celebrate the successes attained in malaria control over the past years.

He added that both the theme and slogan provide “a clarion call for all to commit themselves to advocate and solicit for support for more resources and commodities and inter-sectorial collaboration to fight malaria.”

Marte while highlighting the successes recorded in recent years in the war against malaria, said the state has had four rounds of uninterrupted Seasonal Malaria Chemo-prevention (SMC) intervention between 2017 and 2020 through the support of NMEP, GF, NHF and WHO where over 2,000,000 children three months to five years of age were reached every year.

He said: “We have wittnessed an uninterrupted supply of antimalarial commodities, especially the supply of long lasting insecticide treated nets given free to pregnant women during ANC, chidlren under five during immunization session and to newly resettled communities across the the state via the Saving One Million lives programme since 2017.”