By TesfaNews,
In a meeting organized by the African Leaders Malaria Alliance (ALMA) that took place on 26th May 2013 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the out-going Chairperson of ALMA, H.E. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of Liberia, praised Eritrea and other African countries that have achieved the target of reducing malaria incidence and commended the leaders of those countries for their vision and commitment.
Elaborating on the impact of the program and specifying the countries that have achieved the target of reducing malaria incidence, President Sirleaf said:
“Indeed, great progress has been made. Malaria control interventions, including long-lasting insecticidal nets (LLIN), indoor residual spraying (IRS), rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs) and artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs) have been scaled up.” She further said that “as a result of these interventions, nine African countries including Eritrea, Algeria, Botswana, Cape Verde, Namibia, Rwanda, Sao Tome and Principe, South Africa and Swaziland have already achieved or are on track to reduce malaria incidence by 75 percent while Zambia and Madagascar are on track for a reduction of 50 percent to 75 percent by 2015.”
Statistics made available by the Eritrean Ministry of Health show that malaria prevalence in the country has gone down by 90%, and the death rate as the result of Malaria infections has dropped by 95%.
