Ifakara Masterclass Edition 36- New Nets & New Insecticides for Malaria Control: A Masterclass with Profs. Natacha Protopopoff, Abraham Mnzava, Corine Ngufor, Joe Wagman, Seth Irish and Manuel Lluberas.

New Nets & New Insecticides for Malaria Control

The 36th edition of the masterclass hosted by Fredros Okumu from Ifakara Health Institute (IHI) and Sheila Ogoma from Clinton Health Access Initiative(CHAI) features Profs. Natacha Protopopoff, Abraham Mnzava, Corine Ngufor, Joe Wagman, Seth Irish and Manuel Lluberas.

Malaria control measures have come a long since the introduction of DDT in 1912 with the use of DDT- Kerosene mix to protect soldiers and natives from insect borne diseases in South East Asia during the first and second world war to relatively wide use of Insecticide treated nets (ITN) all over the globe at present. With the launch of Global malaria action plan in 2008 to intensify the use of LLINs, 350 million LLINs were distributed in Africa between 2008 and 2010 followed by further distribution of 465 million LLINs in Africa from 2012 to 2014. And in 2018 18 LLIN´s and 6 insecticide treatment kits were prewualified by the WHO.

The use of ITN´s and LLIN´s have contributed hugely to reduce transmission and aided towards reaching the goal of malaria elimination. Pyrethroids being the only insecticide recommended for use on LLINs, resistance developed against it impacted the efforts to control disease transmission hence  presenting another challange towards malaria elimination.

A New Net Project (NNP) has been lauched to measure the impact of new nets and standard ITNs and feasible PBO ITNs through observational studies comparing trends in parasite prevalence, Malaria prevalence in antenatal care and malaria case incidence.