WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, which inspired numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to assist the poor and deprived worldwide, issued a Special Report on how the alarming increase of mosquito-blamed cases in U.S. may awaken Westerners to the deadly scourge of malaria that still claims thousands of lives worldwide.
A study of Africa released in the spring of 2019 found that the single-most important factor to a 15-year decline in malaria fatalities was increased distribution of insecticide-treated bed nets. (Photo by Nothing But Nets)
Rising to the Challenge
Drs. Nana Minkah (back) and Deba Goswami work with Kappe Lab colleagues to develop a vaccine for malaria. (Photo by Seattle Children’s Hospital)
One of the ironies in the fight against malaria is that past victims are combating it, including people like Dr. Nana Minkah, a scientist at the Kappa Lab at Seattle Children’s Hospital. Growing up in the sub-Saharan nation of Ghana, he contracted the disease multiple times. Among his memories are bouts when he spent more than a week in bed with pain and chills so bad he visibly shivered.
In 2015, after earning a Ph.D. in molecular genetics and biology, Dr. Minkah joined the Kappa Lab. Even though he didn’t have experience in parasitology, he wanted to work on malaria, especially since it still plagues his homeland.
One of the ways the lab hopes to pioneer new methods of preventing malaria is with genetically engineered vaccines. In March of 2019, it successfully completed a vaccine with a first-generation strain of the most lethal parasite. Such vaccines rely on a basic principle: to give the immune system an advantage over a pathogen by teaching it to recognize the invader before the infection occurs.
“I wanted to do work that has clinical implications with the potential to save the lives of people who look like me,” Dr. Minkah said. “What we are trying to do is a tall order. We are trying to develop a product that will create unnatural immunity.”[1]
Despite such inspiring stories, challenges still exist. For example, while malaria was eliminated in the U.S. in 1951, the country still has Anopheles mosquitoes that can bite an infected person and transmit to others.
Health workers take a blood sample from an infant to test for malaria at a clinic along the border between Thailand and Myanmar. (Photo by Ben De La Cruz / NPR)
During last summer’s EEE outbreak, health officials in five southwest Michigan counties warned of a “critical risk” of the virus in 35 communities, with another 40 at high risk. Dr. Brian Chow, a doctor of infectious diseases at Tufts Medical Center, said 2019 seemed to be much more severe than in years past. “It is a concern,” Chow said.[2]
Such situations point to the vigilance needed for the fight. A 2019 article in the Scientific American pointed out how, over time, drug treatment of the disease lose their effectiveness as parasites grow resistant to it. For example, in the 1990s, chloroquine was of first-line importance in Africa. By the early 2000s, that drug was replaced by sulfadoxine/primethamine and later ACTs (for Artemisinin Combination Therapy). Each time, resistance developed.
“While mutation in this gene has occurred in Southeast Asia and is spreading around the region, there are fears it will spread to Africa, like it did for the drugs before it,” wrote Ify Aniebo, a research scientist and fellow at Harvard’s school of public health. “The more drugs we use to treat malaria parasites, the more resistant they become due to selective pressure.”[3]
It is widely accepted that next-generation antimalarial drugs must target the parasite at multiple stages to both cure the disease in an infected individual and prevent its spread to others.
Ironically, even as parasites adapt to resist technology, one of the most effective methods to combat malaria is rather old-fashioned: mosquito nets. A study of Africa released in the spring of 2019 found that the single-most important factor to a 15-year decline in malaria fatalities—from 840,000 deaths in 2000 to 440,000 in 2015—was increased distribution of insecticide-treated bed nets. The authors of the study estimate they were responsible for averting 451 million cases during that 15-year period.[4]
Surrounding World Malaria Day 2020, WHO joins the RBM Partnership to End Malaria, the AUC and other organizations in promoting “Zero malaria starts with me” a grassroots campaign that aims to keep malaria high on the political agenda, mobilize additional resources, and empower communities to take ownership of malaria prevention and care. (Photo by World Health Organization, World Malaria Day 2020)
Joining the Fight
This study highlights the importance of one group’s primary methods of fighting the disease in South Asia: distributing mosquito nets free of charge to vulnerable families. Workers supported by Gospel for Asia (GFA)distributed 360,000 nets in 2018.
Through the gift of a simple net given by Gospel for Asia (GFA), these children are protected from the mosquitos that transmit malaria that causes death in over 400,000 victims per year.
“As Gospel for Asia (GFA) combats these mosquitoes and the deadly disease they carry, we’re seeking to minimize the risk of children being infected,” founder K.P. Yohannan says in a 2019 press release for World Malaria Day. “It’s part of our commitment to the remote communities and one way to express God’s love for them. Many villagers in remote areas can’t afford to buy mosquito nets or preventive medications. This is why our efforts are so critical.”
Distribution of nets is only one aspect of multi-faceted efforts by Gospel for Asia (GFA) in these areas. The ministry also supports workers who hold free health seminars, distribute vitamins and educate villagers about hygienic routines to reduce the potential for disease and infection.
Such efforts create heart-rending anecdotes, like that of Pastor Ronsher, who serves in an area with high transmission rates. There, impoverished farmers and daily wage laborers struggle to secure proper medical care and hygiene; among their numbers is a couple named Bahman and Salli, whose daughter had been paralyzed for three years. After Pastor Ronsher gave them a net, he visited them for several weeks to teach them how to use it and offer encouragement.
Ironically, even as parasites adapt to resist technology, one of the most effective methods to combat malaria is rather old-fashioned: mosquito nets.
“You helped us by providing a piece of mosquito net in our lives, though you never knew us before,” Bahman said. “Many knew about our problems, but except [for] you, none of them showed their kindness toward us. We are touched with your love.”
Such love may be needed for those living in the U.S. as well. In addition to the increased rate of Eastern Equine Encephalitis cases last year, one malaria researcher at the University of Maryland’s medical school recently warned of limited access to an intravenously-administered drug. The IV treatments are needed for the more serious cases of mosquito-linked diseases in America.
One simple way to make a personal impact on mosquito-borne diseases like malaria, is to consider giving an at-risk family a simple mosquito net to provide them with safety from insects during the day and at night. (Photo by Nothing but Nets)
“Severe malaria is a medical emergency that requires immediate treatment with IV medication to reduce the risk of death,” says Dr. Mark Travassos, a pediatric infectious diseases specialist who cited a 2015 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report showing 1,500 malaria cases in the U.S., of which 259 needed IV treatment.[5]
Dr. Travassos says while oral treatments for malaria are available, in the U.S. these are often not effective in more serious cases: “Severe malaria patients can have brain involvement or repeated vomiting and may not tolerate oral medication, placing them at high risk for complications.”
As his University of Maryland associate, Professor Kathleen Neuzil, puts it, “Malaria is a leading killer worldwide, impacting millions of people each year. While we continue to work on developing vaccines and other treatments, it is critical that patients everywhere have access to the regimens needed to combat this disease.”
That means patients in places as poor as South Asia and as affluent as the U.S.
What can we do about mosquito-driven scourges?
One simple way to fight mosquito-borne diseases like malaria, is to consider giving a needy family a simple Mosquito Net. For only $10, Gospel for Asia’s field partners can distribute one of these effective nets to an at-risk family in Asia and provide them with safety from insects during the day and at night.
Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report on Mosquito-Driven Scourge Touches Even Developed Nations:Malaria Alone Claims 400,000 Lives Per Year —Part 1
WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, which inspired numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to assist the poor and deprived worldwide, issued a Special Report on how the alarming increase of mosquito-blamed cases in U.S. may awaken Westerners to the “deadly scourge” of malaria that still claims thousands of lives worldwide.
Because the deaths came in ones and twos, the mid-summer and early fall 2019 headlines were more local than national in scope. They told of a 70-year-old man in Massachusetts—one of 10 people infected in the state—dying from Eastern equine encephalitis (EEE)s, a virus transmitted through a mosquito bite; two deaths in Connecticut, where officials identified EEE-carrying mosquitoes in a dozen municipalities; and a 68-year-old man in Ohio who died from mosquito-linked West Nile virus.
It is critical that patients everywhere have access to the regimens needed to combat this “deadly scourge.” (Photo by Nothing but Nets)
Before the year ended, more than a dozen fatalities had been recorded. As of mid-November, the Centers for Disease Control reported three dozen cases of EEE in 2019, the highest in 60 years.[1] The annual average for the previous decade: just seven.
Granted, a relative handful of tragic fatalities from EEE doesn’t compare to thousands of deaths attributed each year to malaria, which still vexes health officials centuries after its discovery. Still, this five-fold increase in EEE cases may have helped sensitize Americans to the scourge of mosquito-borne health dangers. Such an awakening was especially timely with the observance of World Malaria Day on April 25, which draws attention to the 400,000 lives per year lost to this deadly disease.
In fact, while the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases worldwide (on the date this report was first published) currently stands at 2.5 million and rising, each year there are more than 200 million reported cases of malaria, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
A previous special report on this topic, entitled “Fighting Malaria – A Chilling Disease,” details how mosquito netting and malaria prevention are being used to combat this parasitic genius. This update unfolds the ongoing efforts of the global community to combat mosquito-borne scourges, including malaria, even among developing nations.
Despite advances in recent years, malaria remains a leading cause of death globally.
The latest World Malaria Report, released December 2019 by the World Health Organization (WHO), said 405,000 people died from the disease in 2018.
While that is less than the 435,000 fatalities recorded the previous year, the number of cases rose from 220 million to 228 million, a 3.6 percent increase (since 2016, cases are up 5.6 percent). A staggering 93 percent occurred in the African region in 2018, followed by Southeast Asia (3.4 percent) and the eastern Mediterranean (2.1 percent).
There was a mixture of good and bad news in the report.
Globally, malaria’s incident rate declined from 2010 to 2018. Formerly at 71 cases per thousand in population, the rate slowed to 57 in 2014. Yet it remained at similar levels the next four years. The reductions were most encouraging in Southeast Asia, where 17 cases per thousand in 2010 declined to five cases in 2018, a 70 percent decrease. Also on the positive side, the WHO said more countries moved toward zero indigenous cases, with 49 countries reporting less than 10,000 in 2018.
However, between 2015 and 2018, only 31 countries where malaria is still endemic were on track to reduce this rate by 40 percent or more by this year.[2] Without major changes, the WHO’s long-term global strategy for 2015−30 may not reach milestones for morbidity in 2025 and 2030.
Despite advances in recent years, malaria remains a leading cause of death globally.
The latest World Malaria Report, released last December by the World Health Organization (WHO), said 405,000 people died from the disease in 2018.
While that is less than the 435,000 fatalities recorded the previous year, the number of cases rose from 220 million to 228 million, a 3.6 percent increase (since 2016, cases are up 5.6 percent). A staggering 93 percent occurred in the African region in 2018, followed by Southeast Asia (3.4 percent) and the eastern Mediterranean (2.1 percent).
There was a mixture of good and bad news in the report.
Globally, malaria’s incident rate declined from 2010 to 2018. Formerly at 71 cases per thousand in population, the rate slowed to 57 in 2014. Yet it remained at similar levels the next four years. The reductions were most encouraging in Southeast Asia, where 17 cases per thousand in 2010 declined to five cases in 2018, a 70 percent decrease. Also on the positive side, the WHO said more countries moved toward zero indigenous cases, with 49 countries reporting less than 10,000 in 2018.
However, between 2015 and 2018, only 31 countries where malaria is still endemic were on track to reduce this rate by 40 percent or more by this year.[2] Without major changes, the WHO’s long-term global strategy for 2015−30 may not reach milestones for morbidity in 2025 and 2030.
Advancements in the Fight
Thanks to a consortium of governments, foundations and non-governmental organizations, there have been advancements in treatment. In 2015 the WHO announced the global incidence of malaria had finally slowed: Between 2000 and 2015, mortality rates in Africa fell by 66 percent overall and 71 percent among children under 5, the most vulnerable victims.[3]
“The last decade has seen a significant transition in the ways that countries are responding to malaria,” Dr. David Reddy, CEO of the partnership, Medicines for Malaria Venture, said in a 2015 interview. “Significant new international resources (including Global Fund and President’s Malaria Initiative) have been better mobilized in the last 10–15 years to support programmatic strengthening and introduce greatly improved tools to prevent and treat malaria.”[4]
In his foreword to the WHO’s 2019 report, Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreysus noted that at least 10 countries are on track to reach the 2020 elimination milestone set in its long-term global strategy. In 2015, he said all those countries were malaria endemic, but now have either achieved zero indigenous cases or are nearing that goal.
In 2018, 259 million Rapid Diagnostic Tests for malaria were distributed by National Malaria Programs across the globe. Here Souleman Balde, a 32 year-old-community health worker, tests a child for malaria in a village in the Bafata region of eastern #GuineaBissau. (Photo by @UNDP Guinea Bissau / Gwenn Dubourthoumieu)
More resources are appearing too. Just before the release of the WHO report, the board of the Geneva-based Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria approved increased funding for investments over a three-year period (starting in 2020) to fight these epidemics. The investments total more than $12.9 billion U.S. as of March 2020.
Medical advances are occurring as well. In September of 2019, a paper in Science Translation Medicine described how redesigning molecules first designed to treat a skin disease (psoriasis) could lead to an effective new drug. An international team of researchers described modifying a class of molecules called pantothenamides to increase their stability in humans. In brief, the new compounds stop the malaria parasite from replicating in infected people and are effective against parasites resistant to current drugs.[5]
One of the paper’s authors, Penn State University professor Manuel Llinás, said while pantothenamides are potent against parasites, they become unstable within biological fluids because an enzyme clips them apart before they can act. Changing a chemical bond prevents this from happening.
Significant new international resources … in the last 10–15 years … introduce greatly improved tools to prevent and treat malaria
“By also preventing the transmission of malaria parasites from infected people into mosquitoes, these pantothenamides can reduce the chances that mosquitoes will be infectious to others,” Llinás said. “It is currently widely accepted that next-generation antimalarial drugs must target the parasite at multiple stages to both cure the disease in an infected individual and prevent its spread to others.”
This news came on the heels of a story by Joshua Carroll in The Guardian newspaper about Myanmar becoming an example in the fight against malaria. It chronicled how thousands of volunteers received training and supplies from donors after political reforms opened the door for a flood of aid.
These efforts helped save thousands of lives and turned Myanmar into a leader in the battle to eliminate the disease. Nationwide in 2010 nearly 4,000 people died from malaria, but in 2017 that number dropped to 200.
“Dr. Patricia Graves, a leading specialist on the transmission and control of malaria, is confident Myanmar is on track to be malaria-free by 2030,” Carroll wrote. “The country’s success with village-based health workers ‘is a huge thing that other countries can learn from,’ she says.”[6]
What can we do about mosquito-driven scourges?
One simple way to fight mosquito-borne diseases like malaria, is to consider giving a needy family a simple Mosquito Net. For only $10, Gospel for Asia’s field partners can distribute one of these effective nets to an at-risk family in Asia and provide them with safety from insects during the day and at night.
Read the rest of Gospel for Asia’s Special Report on Mosquito-Driven Scourge Touches Even Developed Nations:Malaria Alone Claims 400,000 Lives Per Year —Part 2
WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, has been the model for numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to help the poor and deprived worldwide, issued this second part of a Special Report on Malaria – new vaccine heralds a game-changing development.
Tricking Mosquitoes With … ‘Toxic’ Beetroot Juice?
In the seemingly never-ending quest to wipe out malaria—responsible in 2019 for the deaths of more than 400,000 people worldwide, roughly equivalent to wiping out the entire population of Miami, Florida—scientists are experimenting continually with new ideas to combat “the enemy” … the pesky mosquito.[17]
Perhaps one of the most unusual ideas involves “toxic” beetroot juice.
Researchers at Sweden’s Stockholm University have been preying on mosquitoes searching for their next tasty blood meal. They’ve shown that it’s possible to mimic a blood feast using beetroot juice laced with a “toxic” plant-based solution that kills mosquitoes but doesn’t harm other species, such as bees.[18]
Until the malaria vaccine usage is widespread, there are still a number of simple but highly effective solutions to combat malaria. One is mosquito bed nets. Another in process, is toxic beetroot, which kills the female carriers.
Beetroot is part of a simple “pink juice” mixture which mimics mosquito’s food drawing in the pest and safely dispatching of it without harming other organisms.
According to an October 2021 report in ScienceDaily, the Swedish team tested four different ingredients in a beetroot juice cocktail. All the mosquitoes feeding on the “fake blood” died within a few hours.[19]
“This mixture, [which] we call ‘pink juice,’ is a harmless … eco-friendly solution, but it is naturally toxic for female mosquitoes,” said Noushin Emami, a professor in the university’s Department of Molecular Biosciences.[20] The Stockholm researchers hope to see their “feeding trap” tested in the field and eventually used alongside other effective mosquito control measures.
“There are a number of … approaches targeting mosquitoes … but I believe that there is a lot of potential in developing very simple but highly effective solutions,” Emami said. “We used beetroot in this study to demonstrate exactly this point.”[21]
Molecular Attraction team. From left: Johan Paleovrachas, Co-founder and Chairman, Noushin Emami, PhD, Co-founder and CSO, Aleksandra Gromnicka, Project Manager, Lech Ignatowicz, PhD, Co-founder and CEO. Photo by Molecular AttractionPeople typically get malaria after being bitten by an infective female Anopheles mosquito.
Facing a Global Emergency
Despite recent breakthroughs and progress, malaria remains one of the biggest threats to children’s lives on the global stage. “Every two minutes, a child dies of malaria,” said UNICEF’s Stefan Swartling Peterson.[22] According to the agency, nearly half of the world’s population is at risk. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) says the mosquito is the most deadly creature in the world—killing more people each year than sharks, wolves, lions, crocodiles and snakes combined.[23]
USAID’s indoor residual spraying activity has protected almost 7 million Ugandans from malaria, and contributed to reducing malaria infection rates in targeted districts by 55 percent.
In a June 30, 2021 news release from the World Health Organization, it was stated that “Globally, 40 countries and territories have been granted a malaria-free certification from WHO—including, most recently, El Salvador (2021), Algeria (2019), Argentina (2019), Paraguay (2018), and Uzbekistan (2018).”[25]
In June 2021—following a 70-year battle against malaria—China joined the coveted list of malaria-free countries. WHO described it as a “notable feat” for the world’s most populous nation.[26]
In the 1940s, China reported 30 million cases of malaria each year.[27] According to a CNN report, during the Vietnam War, more Chinese soldiers died from malaria than bullets in the mosquito-ridden jungles.[28] China is the first country in more than 30 years in the Western Pacific region to rid itself of the disease.[29]
Many nonprofits are on the frontlines, operating health clinics, providing medicine, and distributing lifesaving bed nets in even the most isolated places.
WHO credits China’s success in eradicating malaria to aggressive government action to wipe out mosquito breeding grounds, develop better antimalarial drugs and pioneer preventive measures. In the 1980s, China was one of the first countries to test insecticide-treated bed nets on a large scale—showing that widespread use of bed nets at night could significantly reduce mosquito bites and malaria cases.[30]
China has a long history of malaria, but it has now maintained zero indigenous malaria cases for four years running, down from an estimated 30 million cases and 300,000 deaths per year in the 1940s. This malaria free certification by WHO in 2021 is a significant life-saving achievement for China, showing the potential for real progress in the fight against malaria. Photo by WHO/C.McNab
The Battle On the Frontlines: Mosquito Nets
Science and facts tell part of the story. But the real-life impact of malaria is unfolding right now in the rural villages of sub-Saharan Africa, the teeming cities of Asia and the Amazon rainforests of South America.
Many global nonprofit organizations—including World Vision, Save the Children and GFA World—are on the frontlines, operating health clinics, providing medicine, and distributing lifesaving bed nets in even the most isolated places.
“Some of their communities are in such deep trouble fighting this disease, our workers were dealing with thousands of cases,” said Gospel for Asia (GFA World) founder K.P. Yohannan. In one malaria-prone area of Asia, workers climbed a mountain on foot to reach a remote, mountaintop community caught in a malaria death cycle, Yohannan said. “The people of this community, extremely isolated … didn’t know how to prevent or treat malaria.”
Sikkim: Because of mountainous terrain in many parts of India, Gospel for Asia (GFA World) teams often hand carry critical provisions, like mosquito nets, on their backs while climbing mountains to reach the villages in need of supplies.
Gospel for Asia (GFA World) missionaries—driven by the belief that every human life is precious to God—distributed some 200 mosquito bed nets they’d carried up the mountain, as well as malaria medicine, and showed the local people how to protect themselves and halt the deadly wave.
“From the day they brought the medicine and nets, not a single person in that community died of malaria,” Yohannan said. “What does this tell us? In remote, malaria-ridden places across Asia, a mosquito net can change an entire community.”
West Bengal 1-4-22: These four motherless sisters were very happy to receive a bed net for their family to keep them safe from mosquito bites and other insects. The oldest daughter works to make ends meet, but earns less than 100 rupees a day.
One Less Thing to Fear
Living in an area with high rates of malaria, Bahman and his wife, Salli, were terrified they’d lose their two young daughters to the disease. They knew a mosquito net—costing about $10—would be a potential lifesaver. But they were too poor to afford one.
Increasing their fear, one of their daughters had been paralyzed for three years. If she contracted malaria, would she survive?
That’s when a local Gospel for Asia (GFA) missionary realized the dilemma facing the couple and their neighbors. He took action—and 100 families, including Bahman’s, were given bed nets. “You helped us by providing a piece of mosquito net in our lives, though you never knew us before,” Bahman said. “We are touched with your love.”
West Bengal 8-17-16: Gospel for Asia (GFA World) national missionary, and helpers, and the local village head, distributed some eight hundred mosquito nets to local villagers from economically poor and underprivileged backgrounds.
Making It Personal Makes a Difference
For $10, about the cost of morning coffee, you can gift a life-saving mosquito net to an Asian parent, like this father in West Bengal, India, who earns just $3/day, and cannot afford to buy one himself. He can then safeguard his loved ones from harmful mosquito bites that carry vector-borne diseases like malaria. His family will be forever grateful to you.
For many of us born and raised in a malaria-free country, malaria is not something we worry about. It’s a “tropical disease” that’s a long way from affecting our lives. Mosquito bites are an itchy annoyance—that’s all.
This was certainly true for me—until the day I watched malaria’s deadly fever grip my African friends in Uganda. That’s when it became personal for me. They were suffering on the edge of death because they couldn’t afford a basic bed net or antimalarial tablets that cost just a few dollars—things that were readily available, and that I took for granted.
For $10, you can place a life-saving bed net into the hands of a family at risk, a family—like Bahman’s—who will be forever grateful. So far, GFA World’s national missionaries have given out more than 1.3 million mosquito nets. They’d love to hand out millions more.
China has shown us it’s possible to obliterate malaria from the world’s most populated country. And now—with an effective vaccine—the end is finally in sight around the globe. If we all work together, we can see malaria eradicated everywhere.
One simple way to fight mosquito-borne diseases like malaria, is to consider giving a needy family a simple Mosquito Net. For only $10, Gospel for Asia’s field partners can distribute one of these effective nets to an at-risk family in Asia and provide them with safety from insects during the day and at night.
About GFA World
Gospel for Asia (GFA World) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In a typical year, this includes thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching to provide hope and encouragement in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. GFA World has launched programs in Africa, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit the Press Room at https://gfanews.org/news.
Read the rest of this GFA World Special Report: Malaria – It’s Time to Buzz Off!New Vaccine Heralds a Game-Changing Development—Part 1
Learn more how to save families from the sickening agony or death from malaria through the gift of Mosquito Nets that offer protection from the sting of an infected mosquito and help to give their owner a restful nights sleep.
WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, has been the model for numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to help the poor and deprived worldwide, issued this first part of a Special Report on Malaria – new vaccine heralds a game-changing development.
It’s the “buzz” millions around the world have been waiting to hear—the news of a mosquito-busting breakthrough decades in the making.
Nurse Janet Wanyama prepares to vaccinate a child against malaria at the Malava County Hospital, Kakamega, Kenya. Photo by Gavi/2021/White Rhino Films-Lameck Orina
On Oct. 6, 2021, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced that for the first time ever it was recommending the widespread use of a vaccine to protect children at risk of mosquito-borne malaria—one of the biggest killers of children under 5 in sub-Saharan Africa.[1]
In a news universe saturated by COVID-19 recently, this “historic” announcement struggled to make a splash in the mainstream media. But in the ongoing worldwide battle against life-threatening mosquito bites, this vaccine heralds a game-changing development in the fight against malaria.
“This is a historic moment,” said WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “Using this vaccine on top of existing tools to prevent malaria could save tens of thousands of young lives each year.”[2] Every year, more than 260,000 children under the age of 5 in sub-Saharan Africa die from the effects of malaria, according to WHO.[3]
After years of stagnated progress in the fight against the disease in nations such as Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, the breakthrough finally came with a trial vaccine known as RTS, S/AS01—not exactly a memorable name for such a landmark moment.
WHO endorsed widespread use of the four-dose vaccine in areas with “moderate to high P. falciparum malaria transmission,” following a pilot program that’s involved giving the shot to more than 900,000 children since 2019.[4] P. falciparum is also the most prevalent strain in Africa.
“For centuries, malaria has stalked sub-Saharan Africa, causing immense personal suffering,” said Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO’s Africa Regional Director. “We have long hoped for an effective malaria vaccine, and now for the first time ever, we have such a vaccine.”[5]
The breakthrough offers “a glimmer of hope” for the continent that “shoulders the heaviest burden of the disease,” Moeti said.[6]
As of October 2021, more than 2.3 million shots-in-arms had been administered to children in the three-nation pilot program, covering parts of Ghana, Kenya and Malawi. Initial results indicated that more than two-thirds of children who were not sleeping under insecticide-treated bed nets were protected by the vaccine. And the shot—more than 30 years in the making—reduced cases of severe and deadly malaria by 30 percent.[7]
U.S.A. government via the President’s Malaria Initiative and USAID, donated $1.8 million in malaria commodities to the Ministry of Public Health that oversees Madagascar’s annual malaria campaign, including over 2 million rapid diagnostic tests and nearly 2 million doses of treatment for both normal and severe forms of malaria. The supplies were timely because Madagascar had seen a spike in malaria — in the first six months of 2020, over 1 million people there had been diagnosed with malaria and over 600 people died from the disease.
Malaria and Changing Temperatures
The encouraging news, at long last, of an effective vaccine against malaria comes just months after a study by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine suggested rising worldwide temperatures could cause a dramatic increase in malaria cases.[8]
Malaria and dengue fever may start having an even broader reach worldwide if temperatures continue to rise and extend the disease’s transmission season. Transferal will also happen faster as population density increases causing many more to become ill.
According to a report in The Lancet Planetary Health, the European study estimates 8.4 billion people could be at risk from malaria and dengue fever by the end of the century if rising temperatures were to go unchecked and the world’s population continues to ramp up.[9]
While the year 2100 seems a long way off, the European researchers base their dire predictions on “worst-case scenario” effects of greenhouse gas emissions and population density producing warming temperatures of 3.7 degrees Celsius—about 6.6 degrees Fahrenheit.[10]
Malaria could “gradually increase as a consequence of a warming climate in most tropical regions, especially highland areas,” said the report, citing countries potentially at risk as including Ethiopia, Kenya, South Africa, Somalia, Saudi Arabia, Peru, Mexico and Venezuela.[11]
Encouraging news of an effective vaccine against malaria comes just months after a study suggests rising worldwide temperatures could cause a dramatic increase in malaria cases.
What’s more, researchers also predict changes to weather patterns could cause a “northward shift” of the malaria-epidemic belt into North America, northern and central Europe and northern Asia if temperatures heat up, placing populations in the developed and largely malaria-free nations of the West at risk.[12]
But researchers also acknowledge their study faces limitations because they’re unable to predict advances in vaccines and drugs, or future mutations in malaria parasites.[13]
Malaria ‘Cat and Mouse’
A 1125X photomicrograph magnification of a Giemsa stained, thin film blood smear, revealing a mature, Plasmodium malariae schizont.
Meanwhile, researchers at Texas Biomedical Research Institute are playing a game of “cat and mouse” with malaria parasites—trying to catch parasites in the act of mutating into different strains.[14]
Scientists at the San Antonio facility have been studying five different malaria parasite species that infect people, probing how certain parasites mutate as they hide in the liver, where they can lie dormant for months—only to strike later with a vengeance.[15] While such studies of new mutations are in the early stages, it’s hoped they’ll eventually help researchers understand how malaria parasites develop resistance to drugs and evade the body’s immune system. It could also pave the way for new malaria treatments in the future.[16]
Although this man’s house in West Bengal is not properly protected, at least he has a mosquito net that will protect him from harm while sleeping at night, since most of the people in this area suffer from malaria caused by mosquito bites.
These mosquito net recipients were very glad that GFA World distributed bed nets to them as most are from very poor families, working the tea gardens to make less than two hundred rupees a day.
A primary health care center volunteer from Hantapara Tea Garden in West Bengal hands over a mosquito net to an elderly lady in need, during a GFA World bed net distrubution.
These children from West Bengal are happy as their family received a mosquito net from GFA World. Most kids in this region come from families whose parents are daily-wage laborers living on very limited incomes which preclude them from being able to buy things like mosquito nets.
Now this entire family of four can safely sleep inside the large-sized mosquito net they were provided by GFA World in West Bengal, India.
One simple way to fight mosquito-borne diseases like malaria, is to consider giving a needy family a simple Mosquito Net. For only $10, Gospel for Asia’s field partners can distribute one of these effective nets to an at-risk family in Asia and provide them with safety from insects during the day and at night.
About GFA World
Gospel for Asia (GFA World) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In a typical year, this includes thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching to provide hope and encouragement in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. GFA World has launched programs in Africa, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit the Press Room at https://gfanews.org/news.
Read the rest of this GFA World Special Report: Malaria – It’s Time to Buzz Off!New Vaccine Heralds a Game-Changing Development—Part 2
Learn more how to save families from the sickening agony or death from malaria through the gift of Mosquito Nets that offer protection from the sting of an infected mosquito and help to give their owner a restful nights sleep.
WILLS POINT, TX – Global humanitarian agency GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by KP Yohannan, has been the model for numerous charities like Gospel for Asia Canada, to help the poor and deprived worldwide, suggests in a new report, a long-anticipated vaccine breakthrough could mean the end is in sight for one of the world’s most deadly disease.Mosquito-borne malaria is responsible for more than 400,000 deaths worldwide annually, roughly equivalent to wiping out the population of Miami every year, says the report Malaria, It’s Time to Buzz Off! (https://www.gfa.org/press/malaria/)
TIME FOR MALARIA TO BUZZ OFF: Mosquito-borne malaria kills a child somewhere every 2 minutes. GFA World’s (www.gfa.org) new report Malaria, It’s Time to Buzz Off! (https://www.gfa.org/press/malaria/) – released for World Malaria Day, April 25 – spotlights the new vaccine that could help finally eradicate the disease worldwide.
The report – coinciding with World Malaria Day, April 25 – says the disease that’s rampant in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia kills a child somewhere every 2 minutes, making the tiny mosquito more deadly than “sharks, wolves, lions, crocodiles and snakes combined.”
But now that could change with the first-ever approval of a vaccine for widespread use by the World Health Organization (WHO). Calling it “the ‘buzz’ millions around the world have been waiting to hear,” the report describes the new 4-dose vaccine as a “game-changing development.”
By last October, 2.3 million shots-in-arms were administered to children in the 3-nation vaccine trial covering parts of Ghana, Kenya and Malawi in Africa. The vaccine – 30-plus years in the making – reduced cases of severe and deadly malaria by 30%, notes the report.
Malaria and Changing Climate
The encouraging news, at long last, of an effective vaccine comes after a study by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine suggested changing temperatures could eventually cause a dramatic increase in malaria cases.
A staggering 8.4 billion people could be at risk from malaria and dengue fever by the end of the century if rising temperatures “were to go unchecked and the world’s population continues to ramp up,” the report cites scientists as predicting.
Changes to weather patterns “could cause a northward shift of the malaria-epidemic belt into North America, northern and central Europe, and northern Asia if temperatures heat up,” the report goes on, “placing populations in the developed and largely malaria-free nations of the West at risk.”
Malaria Missionaries
Organizations like Gospel for Asia (GFA World) fight malaria in even the most remote locations, such as the mountains of South Asia. Driven by their belief that “every life is precious to God,” the agency’s local missionaries climbed a mountain on foot to deliver lifesaving mosquito bed nets and malaria medicine to isolated villagers.
“From the day they brought the medicine and nets, not a single person in that community died of malaria,” said Gospel for Asia (GFA World) founder K.P. Yohannan (Metropolitan Yohan), whose organization’s local missionaries have given out more than 1.3 million mosquito nets in communities across Asia. “This truly shows people that God cares about them.”
China: A Malaria Success Story
Last year, after a 70-year battle against the disease, China was declared malaria-free – the first country in the Western Pacific region in more than 3 decades to rid itself of the disease. During the Vietnam War, “more Chinese soldiers died from malaria than bullets in the mosquito-ridden jungles,” the report says.
“China has shown us it’s possible to obliterate malaria from the world’s most populated country,” the report continues. “And now, with an effective vaccine, the end is finally in sight around the globe.”
About GFA World
Gospel for Asia (GFA World) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In a typical year, this includes thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching to provide hope and encouragement in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. GFA World has launched programs in Africa, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit the Press Room at https://gfanews.org/news.
Learn more how to save families from the sickening agony or death from malaria through the gift of Mosquito Nets that offer protection from the sting of an infected mosquito and help to give their owner a restful nights sleep.
WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, has been the model for numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to help the poor and deprived worldwide, issued this second part of a Special Report update on Malaria making a comeback amid the worldwide impact of the COVID 19 Pandemic.
Progress Ebbs and Flows in the Fight to Beat Malaria
Recent developments in the fight against Malaria have placed a heightened spotlight on World Malaria Day, observed on April 25. Fortunately, despite the high death toll and other troublesome signs lately, not all the news about malaria treatment is bad. There are gains amid the setbacks.
This woman in West Bengal was very grateful to Believers Eastern Church and its leaders for providing her with a mosquito net to protect herself and her family from vector borne diseases like malaria.
One positive example is Myanmar, where the annual malaria death toll of 3,800 a decade ago has decreased to approximately 170. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria credits the efforts of 17,000 community volunteers who provide rapid testing and treatment, with serious cases referred to health facilities. Volunteers also educate the public through national antimalaria campaigns.14 Unfortunately, it’s unknown if the recent military coup in Myanmar will adversely impact the recent progress it’s achieved in the prevention of malaria.
News of another positive development appeared last October in Legion. About the same time the United States revealed a COVID-19 vaccine would be ready by the end of 2020, the Canadian magazine reported that a noted medical journal announced a new approach to fighting malaria.
Legion reported a clinical researcher for the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has developed a vaccine for mosquito-borne diseases, based on mosquito spit. It causes the immune system to recognize mosquito saliva proteins and produce antibodies. The antibodies promote immunity by binding to pathogens to prevent them from damaging cells, plus coating pathogens and alerting other immune cells to attack and remove them.
“Those antibodies recognize the proteins the next time they’re encountered, sparking an immune response that goes into action to impair or prevent infection—and not just to malaria, it turns out,” wrote author Sharon Adams. “In animal studies, saliva vaccines impaired development of mosquito-borne Zika virus and sandfly-borne leishmaniasis.”15
In the first human trial of this vaccine in 2017, Adams said a strong immune response was observed among 49 volunteers, with only minor side effects. Next it will be tested on larger groups; if clinical trials continue to prove successful, the first effective malaria vaccine may be just around the corner.
Maya from a village in Uttar Pradesh was given a mosquito net as a Christmas gift by Gospel for Asia. She can now protect her family from mosquito bites that transmit vector-borne diseases like malaria, Zika, dengue, encephalitis and more.
In addition to this promising development, a European magazine carried a report from a healthcare company official saying there are antimalaria positives to be gained from the COVID-19 fight. Hogan Bassey, a Nigerian native who experienced several bouts with malaria as a child, noted that the pandemic highlighted system failings in global healthcare. He said if we are able to address those problems, the world will be better positioned to eradicate malaria and other diseases.
The chief innovation officer and founder of LivFul said his company is working with others—including nonprofits—to develop a repellent that it hopes will prove an efficient control tool. It has been working on a project in Ghana with a pharmaceutical company to improve one of the repellant’s ingredients, using LivFul’s technology to drive access.
After moving to the USA from Nigeria, Hogan Bassey began to work on an insect repellent formula to change the world. The true breakthrough for his new company, LivFul, came after partnering with a physical chemist to create a brand-new technology which allows insect repellent to remain on top of the applicant’s skin for 14 hours at a time. Photo by Terry News
“When we developed a revolutionary family-friendly insect repellent to halt the transmission of diseases like malaria and Dengue fever, we knew we could have a significant impact on insect-borne disease,” Bassey wrote in EPM Magazine. “If people in malaria-prone areas can purchase and use our repellent, these diseases can be stopped before they destroy lives, families, communities and industries.”16
Such a product won’t be the first tool developed. National Geographic recently reported hundreds of thousands of children across Kenya, Malawai and Ghana have been receiving the RTS,S vaccine, whose development has taken 35 years and cost hundreds of millions of dollars. While some African health professionals have asked if the expense and logistics of multiple vaccinations are worth it, the magazine said some Chinese scientists have been utilizing a new approach: preventing malaria from even occurring.
It goes back to 1972, when the Chinese discovered Artemisinin, a drug used to treat malaria. Now, scientists there believe Artemisinin Combination Therapies (ACTs) can be delivered to an entire community simultaneously, through Mass Drug Administrations. The goal is to reduce levels of the malaria parasite in human blood, so mosquitoes won’t contract it and spread it.
“The life cycle for a mosquito is 30 days,” explains Ethan Peng, senior manager in Kenya for the Chinese company New South, which manufactures ACTs. “So by mass medication, we can clear the source from all human beings (so) the mosquitoes cannot pick up on the malaria parasite again with their short lifespan.”17
People in rural villages in West Bengal often suffer from malaria, but these folk were very happy to receive mosquito nets for their families. Over eight hundred mosquito nets were gifted to the villagers who come from economically poor backgrounds, and might not have been able to afford to buy them on their own.
Mosquito Nets Still the Leading Tool for Protection
Vandana and Vaibhav are sleeping peacefully on their bed in Maharashtra under their mosquito net which protects them from mosquito bites. They received their bed nets from a Christmas gift distribution from Gospel for Asia.
When it comes to fighting malaria, the bed net still appears to be the leading tool. When COVID-19 hit in March 2020, WHO malaria scientist Pedro Alonso expected the biggest malaria disaster in 20 years after African countries temporarily suspended bed net campaigns.
That didn’t seem to be happening, the scientist said five months later. He credited lobbying by WHO’s Global Malaria Programme and its partners, which persuaded countries to resume their net distribution campaigns. Despite concerns over continuing COVID-19 problems, Alonso said, “We probably stopped the first big blow.”18
Among the many non-governmental organizations doing their part to distribute mosquito nets is Gospel for Asia (GFA).
Since 2010, GFA has distributed more than 1.3 million nets to at-risk residents in mosquito-prone areas, including 380,000 in 2019 (many are treated with insecticide, with availability depending on local conditions).
These efforts are augmented by distribution of malaria pills at GFA’s medical camps. In 2019 the organization hosted nearly 1,300 camps, which are free to attendees.
The difference net distributions make can be seen in the stories of people like Baharupa, a 55-year-old farmer and father of three who felt pressured to drink alcohol at many village-wide events. Not only did he often wind up drunk, he developed an addiction. That all changed after Satyam, a GFA worker, organized a distribution of 4,000 nets.
After 71 years, Bhranti, a widow, no longer has to worry about mosquitoes biting her in the night thanks to the new bed net she received from a distribution event.
“Who can give us mosquito nets without money?” Baharupa wondered. “This shows [the believers’] love towards us.”19This experience so touched Baharupa that it began a transformation in his life.
Another story of relief involves a 71-year-old widow whose husband had died more than a decade prior. With four daughters all married, Bhranti spent evenings alone, worried about the tattered net providing her only protection from mosquitoes. She received a new net through a distribution organized by a GFA worker.
“I am so grateful to the [GFA workers] for their love and care and for providing a mosquito net,” Bhranti says. “Now I do not need to worry about buying a mosquito net as I have been provided a new one.”20
Even amid the problems COVID-19 has caused in poorer parts of the world, GFA’s supporters have been able to help local workers in the field save lives and prevent more tragedies during the pandemic, says Gospel for Asia (GFA) founder, Dr. K.P. Yohannan.
Dr. K.P. Yohannan, GFA World Founder
“Without proper prevention or treatment, the consequences of a simple mosquito bite are very serious in many places of the world,” Yohannan says. “But for just $10, we can protect numerous lives, one net at a time.”
One simple way to fight mosquito-borne diseases like malaria, is to consider giving a needy family a simple Mosquito Net. For only $10, Gospel for Asia’s field partners can distribute one of these effective nets to an at-risk family in Asia and provide them with safety from insects during the day and at night.
GFA World (formerly known as Gospel for Asia) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In GFA World’s latest yearly report, this included thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching providing hope and encouragement available in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. In the years ahead, GFA World expects to launch programs in numerous African nations, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit our Press Room at https://press.gfa.org/news.
WILLS POINT, TX – GFA World (Gospel for Asia) founded by K.P. Yohannan, has been the model for numerous charities like GFA World Canada, to help the poor and deprived worldwide, issued this first part of a Special Report update on Malaria making a comeback amid the worldwide impact of the COVID 19 Pandemic.
It’s a back-and-forth battle growing tougher in the face of COVID-19, with mosquitoes responsible for spreading the disease taking on the appearance of brass-helmeted warriors immune to nearly every device aimed in their direction. Malaria, humanity’s most deadly infectious disease, is making a comeback while our primary defense—net distribution—is being handicapped by the disruptions to normal life caused by the worldwide pandemic.
Insecticidal Nets a Mainstay, but Declining to Protect in Some Cases
Niger: Demilla and her children now sleep under the safety of a bed net, which protects them from malaria-carrying mosquitoes, which have regularly affected many of her close family members, including her two children. Photo by Nothing But Nets, Instagram
That news appeared last summer in Nature Communications, which published research showing insecticide-treated mosquito nets—considered a mainstay in combating malaria—are not providing the protection they once did.1
According to another report in ScienceDaily, scientists say that’s cause for concern in tropical and subtropical countries. Long-Lasting Insecticidal Nets (LLINs) were credited with saving 6.8 million lives over a recent 15-year period.2
Dr. Stephen Carl, a malaria researcher in Australia, said LLINs add a community-level protective effect by significantly decreasing the mosquito population, which benefits even people not using nets. In Papua New Guinea, their introduction in 2006 led to a significant decline in cases, but between 2013–14 and 2016–17, the rate of infections rebounded from less than 1 percent to 7.1 percent.3
“[LLINs] are the only tools used at present in the national campaign against the mosquitoes that can carry malaria,” said study co-author Dr. Moses Laman.
“Malaria kills around half a million people worldwide each year, so any suggestion that the nets are not working is cause for grave concern.”4
While conclusions are still being formed on the news reported in Nature Communications, it appears diminished bioefficacy at the manufacturing level may be contributing to the problem of resurgence in malaria incidents.
Mosquito bites will result in more than 700,000 malaria deaths around the world this coming year — wiping out the equivalent of the entire population of Washington, D.C., says a recent report by Gospel for Asia. The report — Winning the Ancient Conflict Between Man and Mosquito — coincided with World Mosquito Day, Aug. 20, 2020.
Debating Treated Nets vs Untreated Nets
But not everyone agrees that treated nets are necessary. Research published just prior to the ScienceDaily report questioned if their cost makes the fight harder. One report in Malaria Journal said although more than 90 percent of the burden occurs in Africa, most prequalified nets approved by the World Health Organization (WHO) are manufactured elsewhere. The publication said many local manufacturers lack the capacity to produce insecticidal nets at a competitive scale and pricing.5
Fredros Okumu is a Kenyan parasitologist and entomologist, who developed a synthetic mosquito lure which was 3-5 times more potent than natural human odor. Photo by Fredros Okumu, Twitter
By relaxing conditions, it is conceivable that non-insecticidal but durable—and possibly biodegradable—nets could be readily manufactured locally, wrote author Fredros Okumu. While not aiming to discredit treated nets, he said he wanted to illustrate how a singular focus on insecticides can hinder innovation and sustainability.6
“The public health value of nets is increasingly driven by bite prevention, and decreasingly by lethality to mosquitoes,” Okumu said. “For context-appropriate solutions, it is necessary to acknowledge and evaluate the potential and cost-effectiveness of durable untreated nets across different settings.”
In his lengthy report, he also observed that developers should, instead of overemphasizing the need for new insecticides, ensure that bed nets are accessible, durable and properly used, even if non-insecticidal.
“New insecticides can then be developed for other forms of vector control,” Okumu said. “It has been demonstrated that resistant mosquitoes can survive up to 1,000-times the concentration of insecticides that kill susceptible populations. Such strongly resistant mosquitoes may naturally incur major survival and fitness costs in nature but are unlikely to be killed directly by insecticidal nets.”7
Malaria caused by mosquitos is one of the main killers in West Bengal, India, as the villages in these areas are surrounded by tea plantations and forests with lots of insects. On World Mosquito Day, August 17th, 2016 the local Believers Eastern Church distributed over eight hundred mosquito nets to villagers from economically poor backgrounds, who would be unable to afford to purchase their own.
Fighting a Coronavirus that Hampers Bed Net Distribution
However one looks at the necessity of treated nets, distribution of any nets—treated or untreated—has been a cause for concern during the coronavirus outbreak.
Writing in Nature Medicine, researchers forecast the possibility of 779,000 deaths in sub-Saharan Africa over a 12-month period, culminating in the summer of 2021.8 That compares to a WHO worst-case estimate of 769,000 malaria deaths this year, a mortality rate not seen in two decades.9
In the face of COVID-19, Okefu Oyale Okoko, deputy director of the National Malaria Elimination Programme in Nigeria, said it would still be important to ensure continuing deployment of vector control interventions to not only sustain gains in malaria elimination, but ensure against its resurgence.
According to a report in The (London) Telegraph, researchers concluded that treating children with fever as if they have malaria, even if not diagnosed with the disease, could save nearly 200,000 lives. And, of course, prompt distribution of bed nets could prevent hundreds of thousands of deaths.
When final statistics are available, researchers from the Imperial College of London predict if control programs were halted due to COVID-19, the number of cases during 2020 could double compared to 2019. In Nigeria alone, they said cutting treatment and delaying the distribution of bed nets could result in 81,000 additional deaths.
James Whiting, Chief Executive at Malaria No More UK, whose goal is to end deaths and suffering from malaria. Since 2000 deaths of the biggest killer disease in human history have been reduced by 60%, saving 7 million lives. But in the last few years malaria has started to rise again per WHO World Malaria Reports. Photo by Hope and Homes for Children
Typically distributed at community meetings, such gatherings to distribute bed nets faced interruptions over the last year because of event cancellations or poor attendance because of coronavirus fears.
Telegraph correspondent Anne Gulland wrote that researchers’ modeling found that provision of bed nets is critical since those treated with long-lasting insecticide have effects that continue for three years. More than half of the 47 countries most badly affected by the disease were due bed net distributions in 2020, with 228 million nets due to be handed out. That would have been the largest number ever.
James Whiting, executive director of Malaria No More UK, told the newspaper: “This important modelling is a reminder that efforts to end malaria sit on a knife edge. Protecting people against COVID-19 cannot be pursued in isolation. Governments must see maintaining efforts against malaria as a core part of pandemic preparedness or risk a catastrophic domino effect.”10
Soon after the Telegraph article, computer magnate turned philanthropist Bill Gates echoed the necessity of not allowing the pandemic to distract attention from the fight against mosquito-borne disease. The pesky insects are out infecting millions with a disease that kills a child every other minute daily, he wrote in his online blog.11
In his lengthy report, [Okumu] observed that developers should, instead of overemphasizing the need for new insecticides, ensure that bed nets are accessible, durable and properly used, even if non-insecticidal.
Gates—head of the Gates Foundation, a key non-governmental organization fighting malaria’s spread—said lockdowns and other regulations made it difficult for health workers to provide prevention and treatment across Africa. He said there were also interruptions to supplies of essential malaria tools like bed nets and anti-malaria medicines. Instrumental in reducing malaria deaths by more than half since 2000, he said interruption of these services could mean mortality levels not seen since the turn of the century.
“There is not a choice between saving lives from COVID-19 versus saving lives from malaria,” Gates wrote. “The world must enable these countries to do both. Health officials urgently need to step up to the challenge of controlling the pandemic while also making sure that malaria, as well as other diseases like HIV and tuberculosis, are not neglected.”12
Dr. Pedro Alonso, director of the World Health Organization’s Global Malaria Program. Photo by ISGlobal
“The world has changed in ways we could never imagine,” observed Dr. Pedro Alonso, director of the WHO’s Global Malaria Programme, in a letter to malaria partners six months after lockdowns began. “As COVID-19 began its rapid spread earlier this year from China to Italy, and beyond, alarm bells began ringing across the malaria community. After taking such a devastating toll on countries with robust health systems, how would malaria-endemic countries in Africa prevail? Among colleagues at WHO, there was deep concern that the coronavirus had the potential to upend years—perhaps decades—of progress in malaria control.”13
One simple way to fight mosquito-borne diseases like malaria, is to consider giving a needy family a simple Mosquito Net. For only $10, Gospel for Asia’s field partners can distribute one of these effective nets to an at-risk family in Asia and provide them with safety from insects during the day and at night.
GFA World (formerly known as Gospel for Asia) is a leading faith-based global mission agency, helping national workers bring vital assistance and spiritual hope to millions across the world, especially in Asia and Africa, and sharing the love of God. In GFA World’s latest yearly report, this included thousands of community development projects that benefit downtrodden families and their children, free medical camps conducted in more than 1,200 villages and remote communities, over 4,800 clean water wells drilled, over 12,000 water filters installed, income-generating Christmas gifts for more than 260,000 needy families, and teaching providing hope and encouragement available in 110 languages in 14 nations through radio ministry. In the years ahead, GFA World expects to launch programs in numerous African nations, starting with compassion projects in Rwanda. For all the latest news, visit our Press Room at https://press.gfa.org/news.
WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA World and affiliates like Gospel for Asia Canada) founded by Dr. K.P. Yohannan – Discussing 71-year-old widow Bhranti, her struggle against the danger of malaria, and Christmas gift distribution of Gospel for Asia provides defense against malaria through mosquito nets.
A
n old, tattered net is all that separated 71-year-old Bhranti from the mosquitoes buzzing outside her home. Any one of those pesky insects potentially carried a historically feared disease: malaria.
Danger All Around
Bhranti, pictured here, no longer has to worry about mosquitoes biting her in the night thanks to the new net she received.
Malaria killed more than 400,000 people worldwide in 2018. The World Health Organization considers mosquito nets among the most important measures taken to combat malaria. Insecticide-treated mosquito nets have helped lower the number of deaths in recent years, and they are the only protection millions of people in Asia have against the harmful disease.
But Bhranti did not have a good net.
Bhranti’s husband passed away more than 10 years ago. All four of her daughters married, leaving the widow by herself. Every night, the ragged net Bhranti used as protection against mosquitoes went over her bed. The older widow desperately needed a new net, but she simply did not possess the money to purchase one.
Blessed with a New Net
Our Pastor Sutak happened to be out ministering one day when he met Bhranti. After conversing with the pastor for a few minutes, Bhranti shared her situation with him. Hearing the widow’s story and seeing her tattered net, Pastor Sutak knew something needed to be done. Before he left Pastor Sutak encouraged Bhranti from God’s Word, saying her needs would be provided for.
By the grace of God, the local church held a Christmas gift distribution in Bhranti’s village later that year. There, the widow was presented with a brand-new mosquito net.
“I am so grateful to the [Gospel for Asia workers] for their love and care and for providing a mosquito net,” Bhranti says. “Now I do not need to worry about buying a mosquito net as I have received a new one.”
Bhranti’s previous fear of contracting malaria is gone, thanks to her new net.
*Names of people and places may have been changed for privacy and security reasons. Images are Gospel for Asia stock photos used for representation purposes and are not the actual person/location, unless otherwise noted.
WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA World) founded by Dr. K.P. Yohannan issues an extensive Special Report on the deadly diseases brought by the mosquito and the storied impact of faith-based organizations on world health, fighting for the Kingdom to “come on earth as it is in heaven.”
This is Part Two of a Three-Part Series on FBO Initiatives to Combat Malaria and Other World Health Concerns. Go here to read Part 1 and Part 3.
Faith-Based Organizations as Seen Through the Bite of the Mosquito
Let’s look at that mosquito again, the anopheles that carries some form of the genus Plasmodium, which is the genesis of several strains of potentially deadly malaria parasites. In addition to malaria, the bite of various mosquitoes can also transmit dengue and yellow fever as well as the Zika, West Nile and African Sleeping Sickness viruses. The long battle against the lone mosquito multiplied by millions of its kind presents a simulacrum through which an enormous topic—modern medicine outreaches as influenced by faith—can be viewed.
One of the specific health ministries Gospel for Asia (GFA) initiated in 2016 was to participate in World Mosquito Day, observed every August 20 to raise awareness about the deadly impact of mosquitoes. This global initiative encourages local governments to help control malaria outbreaks, and it also raises funds from large donor organizations and national governments to underwrite worldwide eradication efforts. Discovering and applying means of mosquito control in overpopulated areas of the world is essential, but the task is so large and the enemy so canny that planners have discovered they must rely on a combination of efforts that activate local communities and the leaders in those communities, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), faith-based organizations (FBOs) and faith-based development organizations (FBDOs).
At a Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported gift distribution, these villagers were grateful to receive a mosquito net.
In 2016, workers collaborating with Gospel for Asia (GFA) distributed some 600,000 mosquito nets, many of which were given to people living in districts where there are high malaria risks and high poverty levels. Due to poverty, these folks were unable to procure the simplest of means to prevent mosquito-borne diseases. In addition to the nets, which were given away without charge, Gospel for Asia (GFA) conducted disease-awareness training in order to heighten understanding about preventive measures.
[su_qoute]In the majority of rural areas, there are no clinics, no hospitals, no medical professionals and no treatment protocols.[/su_quote]
This effort was compatible with the movement back to a primary health care emphasis as delineated in the 1978 Alma-Ata Declaration encouraged by the World Health Organization, which proclaimed the principles of what was meant by the concept of primary health care and the overreaching need for it. While a few populations in developing countries have access to tertiary health care—hospitals and clinics and professionals trained in medical schools, drugs and diagnostic equipment—the vast majority of the rest of the populace can access extremely limited or next-to-no available health care. In the majority of rural areas, for instance, there are no clinics, no hospitals, no medical professionals and no treatment protocols. (This medical desert is also becoming a problem in the United States; as rural populations shrink, hospitals and clinics cannot afford to stay open.)
The Alma-Ata conference recommended a redirection of approaches to what is termed primary health care. Charles Elliott, an Anglican priest and development economist, summarized the suggested changes as follows:
An increasing reliance on paraprofessionals (often referred to as community health workers) as frontline care givers;
The addition of preventive medicine to curative approaches;
A noticeable shift from vertical, disease-specific global health initiatives to integrated, intersectoral programs;
A willingness to challenge the dominant cost-effectiveness of analysis, particularly as it was used to justify a disproportionate distribution of health care resources for urban areas; and
A heightened sensitivity to the practices of traditional healing as complementary rather than contradictory to the dominant Western medical model.
The government working is spraying mosquito repelling smoke in a Mumbai slum to prevent malaria and other mosquito-spread diseases.
India’s Progress in Combating Malaria
In 2015, the World Health Organization set a goal of a 40 percent reduction in malaria cases and deaths by 2020 and estimated that by that deadline, malaria could be eradicated in 11 countries. The first data reports were extremely encouraging, but attrition began to set in, due to what experts feel is a lag in the billions of donor funds needed to combat the disease. The 2018 World Malaria Report health data now indicate a slowing in the elimination of the disease and even growth in disease incidents and deaths. This slide is disheartening to world health officials, particularly since early reports gave evidence of real impact against morbidity.
India, however, according to the 2018 report, is making substantial progress: “Of the 11 highest burden countries worldwide, India is the only one to have recorded a substantial decline in malaria cases in 2017.”
The report goes on to state that the country, which accounted for some 4 percent of global malaria cases, registered a 24 percent reduction in cases over 2016. The country’s emphasis has been to focus on the highly malarious state of Odisha. The successful efforts were attributed to a renewed government emphasis with increased domestic funding, the network of Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs)—an intended 900,000 women assigned to every village with a population of at least 1,000—and strengthened technological tracking, which allowed for a focus on the right mix of control measures. The aim of India’s National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme is the eradication of malaria.
Of the 11 highest burden countries worldwide, India is the only one to have recorded a substantial decline in malaria cases in 2017.
Remember the ever-present mosquito? Studies conducted by WHO released the findings of a major five-year evaluation reporting that people who slept under long-lasting insecticidal nets had significantly lower rates of malaria infection than those who did not use a net.
In coordination with this national effort, Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported workers distributed nets to villagers, in student hostels, among workers in the tea-growing district of Assam and many other areas while at the same time leading disease-awareness programs to tea-garden employees.
These women were happy to receive a free mosquito net for their families from GFA-supported workers.
Imagine a dusty village filled with women wearing vibrant-colored clothing. Little children dance around or stand intrigued, their huge brown eyes open. Nets are placed into outstretched hands. Women smile; gifts are always appreciated. Men listen carefully to the reasons why bed nets are essential and why it is necessary to spray the home and rooms. People bow their heads; they raise pressed hands to their faces. “Namaste,” they say giving thanks.
Envision a room at night with six to eight buzzing, dive-bombing mosquitoes and give thanks that there are organizations around the world that pass out the free gift of bed nets that not only keep humans from being stung but also prevent them from becoming wretchedly ill.
Historical Cooperation
The possibility of eradicating malaria rests in the efforts of Dr. Ronald Ross, born in Almora, India, in 1857 to Sir C.C.G. Ross, a Scotsman who became a general in the Indian Army. Reluctant to go into medicine, the son nevertheless bowed to his father’s wishes to enter the Indian Medical Service.
At first, Ross was unconvinced that mosquitoes could possibly be carriers of malaria bacteria, yet his painstaking, mostly underfunded laboratory discoveries eventually convinced him that the hypothesis of a mentor, Patrick Manson, an early proponent of the mosquito-borne malaria theory, was correct. (Manson is also considered by many to be the father of tropical medicine.) Another contemporary, the French Army doctor Alphonse Laveran, while serving at a military hospital in Algeria, had observed and identified the presence of parasitic protozoans as causative agents of infectious diseases such as malaria and African Sleeping Sickness.
From left to right: Dr. Ronald Ross, Patrick Mason, Alphonse Laveran
On August 20, 1897, in Secunderabad, Ross made his landmark discovery: the presence of the malaria parasite in humans carried by the bite of infected mosquitoes. (For obvious reasons, Ross was also the founder of World Mosquito Day.) Disease can’t be combated unless its source is identified, nor can it be optimally controlled. Certainly, without this knowledge, it can’t be eradicated. In 1902, Ronald Ross was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine.
Here again, through the bite of the mosquito, we see the collaborative effort that undergirds progress. Three doctors intrigued with conquering the morbidity of disease take painstaking efforts to prove their theories, and each one builds on the discoveries of the other, with eventual dramatic results.
Government leaders, among others, came together during the Annual Meeting 2008 of the World Economic Forum for the “Call to Action on the Millennium Development Goals.” Photo by World Economic Forum on Wikipedia / CC BY-SA 2.0
Change Involves Everyone
Progress is not possible without collaborative work. Statisticians, medical teams and universities, as well as local village training centers, governments of developing countries and local leadership in towns and cities must all work together. The job requires donations from wealthy donor nations as well as from national local budgets. We need the skills of technological gurus, engineers and the extraordinary capabilities of highly trained health care professionals and sociologists. In addition, we also need the involvement of those who care about the soul of humans and who have insisted, because their lives are driven and informed by a compassionate theology, that every human is made in the image of God.
Gospel for Asia (GFA), through its mosquito net distribution—and its many other ministries—stands central in the contemporary initiatives of health-based, community-centered, preventive health care.
Progress is not possible without collaborative work.
These are some of the strategic players who must all be involved, and stay involved, if the MDGs, now the Millennium Sustainable Development Goals, are to be reached.
This model of interactivity, whether present-day players realize it or not, intriguingly stems from a decades-old initiative stimulated by the World Council of Churches (WCC) in the last century, based in a carefully crafted theological understanding by the Christian Medical Commission (CMC), which concurrently and cooperatively developed the meaning of health that simultaneously contributed to the WHO’s significant 1978 Declaration of Alma-Ata. This resulted in a focus on primary care as a more just and egalitarian way to distribute resources in order to treat a larger proportion of the world’s population.
The United Nations Building in New York in 2015, displaying the UN’s development goals and the flags of the 193 countries that agreed to them. Photo by Amaral.andre on Wikipedia / CC BY-SA 4.0
This forgotten story needs to be resurrected because it demonstrates the power of intentional intersectoral cooperation between secular and religious health outreaches. It also exemplifies a more holistic redefinition of the meaning of health that has the potential to positively impact disease-ridden environments in the many populations that are generally minimally treated or completely untreated in developing countries. In a day when Western technologically centered medicine, driven by what some in health communities are starting to call the “industrial medical complex,” is beginning to wane in its understanding of the meaning of superior patient-centered care, this model needs to be adapted to what we think of as the more sophisticated treatment approaches in health care.
Our Friends, the Critics (Because Their Criticism Makes Us Think)
Let’s first take a quick look at what critics of faith-based medical outreaches have to say. Instead of delving into the academic literature, which though informative often provides a tedious plod through footnotes and specialized terminology, let’s look at the growing field of “opinion” journalism.
After the 2014 Ebola outbreak in Liberia, Africa, an article appeared in Slate Magazine by Brian Palmer, a journalist who covers science and medicine for the online magazine. This periodical represents an admittedly liberal perspective, and that bias, though the author attempts to play fair, is shown even in the headline to his report: In Medicine We Trust: Should we worry that so many of the doctors treating Ebola in Africa are missionaries?” Great lead line; it certainly caught the attention of my friends and colleagues who work in medical missions.
Palmer summarizes his basic critique in this paragraph: “There are a few legitimate reasons to question the missionary model, starting with the troubling lack of data in missionary medicine. When I write about medical issues, I usually spend hours scouring PubMed, a research publications database from the National Institutes of Health, for data to support my story. You can’t do that with missionary work, because few organizations produce the kind of rigorous, peer-reviewed data that is required in the age of evidence-based medicine.”
Although PubMed is a worthy venue for medical specialists as well as the generalist writing in the field—with some 5.3 million archived articles on medical and health-related topics—it alone may be a truncated resource for the kind of information that could have more richly framed this article. Interviews with at least a few boots-on-the-ground, living faith-based medical professionals who have given their lives to wrestling with the health care needs in countries far afield from Western medical resources, might also have been a better means of achieving a professional journalistic approach. In addition, there is a whole body of evidence-based research that a superficial treatment such as this did not access.
Dr. Bill and Sharon Bieber Photo credit Healing Lives.
Sharon Bieber of Medical Ambassadors International responds to the Slate article out of a lifetime of framing health care systems with her husband, Dr. Bill Bieber, in mostly underdeveloped nations in the world. It is important to note the Canadian government awarded these “medical missionary types” the Meritorious Service Medal—an award established by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II to be given to extraordinary people who make Canada proud—for their work of establishing the Calgary Urban Project Society. The Calgary Urban Project Society became the model across all Canada for helping those most in need (many of them homeless) by providing health care, education and housing—all this long before the concept of holistic treatment or an integrated approach engaging mind, body and spirit was part of the common literacy of health professionals. This, to be noted, was accomplished by the Biebers while on an extended furlough while their children finished high school—an interregnum before the two headed back to the South China Seas to fulfill their lifetime calling of working with national governments to establish primary health care systems along with improving tertiary systems in the countries where they landed.
Bieber writes, “Author Brian Palmer even queries the reliability of the mission doctors, who work in adverse and under-resourced conditions. The lack of trust seems to be justifiable, he infers, because they rarely publish their accomplishments in the ivory towers of academia! When they explain to patients they are motivated by the love of Jesus rather than financial gain, somehow that is ‘proselytizing.’ Would it be nobler, I wonder, if doctors were to tell them that the danger pay was good or that they desire adventure or fame? These are unproductive and unfounded arguments by critics who clearly have their own axes to grind, and at a time when the world crisis calls for everyone to roll up their sleeves and get to work in solving the problems facing us all.
“Surely the relief and development organizations that are out there in the world can come to the same conclusion on this one thing—everybody is needed in order to fight diseases such as Ebola, HIV/AIDS or tuberculosis; every agency has strengths that will add to the synergy of the whole. Whether faith-based, local and national government or secular NGO, all have been trained in similar techniques and scientific method. Collaboration is what is needed in order for groups that are stronger to support those that are less resourced to achieve a common goal.”
Dr. Kent Brantly contracted Ebola while minstering in Liberia. He recovered and was featured on Time Magazine’s cover, representing Ebola fighters—Time’s “People of the Year.” Photo credit Facing Darkness
To be fair, the Slate journalist admits to being conflicted. After listing the flaws of medical mission approaches, Palmer writes, “And yet, truth be told, these valid critiques don’t fully explain my discomfort with missionary medicine. If we had thousands of secular doctors doing exactly the same work, I would probably excuse most of these flaws. ‘They’re doing work no one else will,’ I would say. ‘You can’t expect perfection.’ ”
At least he admits to bias. Knowing my share of medical missionaries, many of whom I consider truly heroic and who are radicalizing the health care systems of the countries in which they serve for the undeniable betterment of those societies, Palmer’s approach seems a tad unprofessional as far as journalism goes. He concludes, “As an atheist, I try to make choices based on evidence and reason. So until we’re finally ready to invest heavily in secular medicine for Africa, I suggest we stand aside and let God do His work.”
“Through partnership with faith organizations and the use of health promotion and disease-prevention sciences, we can form a mighty alliance to build strong, healthy, and productive communities.”
A deeper search in PubMed, driven admittedly by my own bias, led me to the excellent data-informed article utilizing research on the topic from both the scientific, theological and academic sectors by Jeff Levin, titled “Partnerships between the faith-based and medical sectors: Implications for preventive medicine and public health.”
Levin concludes with a quotation that complements his conclusion: “Former U.S. Surgeon General David Satcher, a widely revered public health leader, has made this very point: ‘Through partnership with faith organizations and the use of health promotion and disease-prevention sciences, we can form a mighty alliance to build strong, healthy, and productive communities.’ There is historical precedent for such an alliance, and informed by science and scholarship, it is in our best interest for this to continue and to flourish.”
Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported workers assisted government relief efforts after the Kerala flooding in August 2018. Here they are assembling packages of food items and other essential supplies to distribute to flood victims.
How many of us in the faith-based sector have wrestled with the theological meaning of health? What is the history of the impact of faith (particularly Christian faith because that is the bias from which I write) on the ongoing movement of medicine in these modern centuries? Why does it matter?
I recently experienced a small snapshot of current industrialized medicine. Last year I underwent a hiatal repair laparoscopic surgery. The best I can ascertain from the Medicare summary notice, which included everything administered the day of the procedure through an overnight stay in the hospital for observation with a release the next day, was the bill.
In addition, I experienced watching a son die at age 41 (Jeremy, the son who accompanied me to Mexico, leaving behind a wife and three small children, then ages 6, 4 and six months), not only from a rare lymphoma that kept him in a superior hospital in Chicago for more than five months but also from the side effects and complications of the aggressive cancer treatments. This all has given me additional perspective on medical approaches.
It Takes Only One Mosquito — to lead to remarkable truths about faith-based organizations and world health:Part 1 | Part 3
WILLS POINT, TX – Gospel for Asia (GFA World) founded by Dr. K.P. Yohannan issues an extensive Special Report on Malaria and other deadly diseases brought by the mosquito and the storied impact of faith-based organizations on world health, fighting for the Kingdom to “come on earth as it is in heaven.”
This is Part One of a Three-Part Series on FBO Initiatives to Combat Malaria and Other World Health Concerns. Coming Soon are Parts 2 and Parts 3.
=====
It takes only one mosquito, buzzing around with ill intent, dive-bombing in the middle of the night, hovering ominously around a would-be sleeper’s ear, to cause alert wakefulness and ruin the REM-phase of deep slumber. Five or six mosquitoes, all in disharmonic buzzing in one room, demand that the sleepy occupants get up and destroy the pesky insects, no matter how many bug guts get left on the walls.
Interestingly, research about the ubiquitous presence of the mosquito led me to a startling discovery about the Gospel’s mostly unknown and stunning impact on the development of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) eight Millennium Development Goals. This is an article about that impact. Let me start at the beginning.
Malaria parasite (plasmodium)
My son Jeremy, post-college and conveniently fluent in Spanish, was helping me with a writing project in Mexico thanks to some excess flight mileage points. Jeremy, at that time, was a counselor for World Relief, an international organization that assists churches to sponsor refugees. He had become proficient in dealing with immigration issues and consequently was open to being bribed by his mother to spend five work-and-play days on the Mexican Riviera.
One night, we returned to our room unaware the maid had neglected to close the screenless windows after cleaning. Finally resigned to the reality that hiding under the sheets was a futile deterrent against bloodthirsty pests, we turned on the lights and did battle royal, swinging towels and rolled-up manuscripts, until we were certain that not a single mosquito had survived the slaughter.
And yes, there were bug guts all over the walls.
I remember falling to sleep that night, deeply satisfied with our search-and-destroy mission, and suddenly catching myself thinking: What if this were a malaria-ridden country? It would only take one mosquito, the female anopheles, to transmit one of the parasites on the spectrum belonging to the genus Plasmodium. It only takes one mosquito bite in a person lacking immunity to bloom into rampant malaria some 10–15 days later.
A mosquito net can be the difference between life and death in some areas, protecting families from the bite of malaria-spreading mosquitoes while they sleep.
Mosquito Nets Versus Malaria
It may seem strange in countries or communities that maintain sophisticated mosquito abatement programs to learn that mosquito nets across the world are one of the most important means of saving lives.
Stagnant water is a perfect breeding ground for mosquitoes, endangering those living nearby.
Gospel for Asia (GFA) tells the story of Pastor Ojayit walking through villages and inquiring of residents as to whether they had been afflicted by malaria and if they needed mosquito nets. (These, for those who are unaware, are hung over beds, sleeping cots or hammocks at night.) The pastor was deeply moved by the numerous folk who had suffered with the mosquito-borne illness. One man named Madin, along with his family, had been ill with malaria and brain malaria on several occasions. Extreme poverty kept the family from affording medication or prevention treatments to combat the disease or the airborne insects that carried the disease.
Pastor Ojayit added Madin’s name to the list of recipients for the next Gospel for Asia (GFA)-supported Christmas gift distribution so he could receive a mosquito net. That simple gift meant, for the first time, Madin and his family began to thrive. The children could attend school; they all could gain back health. The gift of a mosquito net also demonstrated the practical application of God’s love and concern for the people of the world.
A mosquito net can be the difference between life and death—but the fight with malaria is far from over.
By Peteri/Shutterstock.com
The 2018 World Malaria Report indicated that in 2017, after an unprecedented period of early success stimulated by the World Health Organization’s campaign to bring malaria under global control, progress in fighting the disease has stalled. There were an estimated 219 million cases and 435,000 related deaths in 2017. This was up from 217 million cases in 2016. Evaluations as to the possible cause of this slide include a decrease of billions of donor dollars due to other disastrous disease episodes worldwide.
The report also added that 11 countries bear 70 percent of the burden of this particular global disease: Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Uganda, Tanzania and India, most of them in tropical or subtropical areas of the world, most often where there are impoverished populations.
Millennium Development Goals & Millennium Sustainable Development Goals
Despite this setback in malaria eradication, health indicators from around the world show that a handful of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), introduced by the World Health Organization and announced in September 2000, are meeting or exceeding fulfillment expectations. The eight Millennium Development Goals are:
The eight Millenium Development Goals. Photo by Kjerish on Wikipedia / CC BY-SA 4.0
The WHO Declaration notes that the “MDGs are inter-dependent; all the MDGs influence health, and health influences all the MDGs. For example, better health enables children to learn and adults to learn. Gender equality is essential to the achievement of better health. Reducing poverty, hunger and environmental degradation positively influences, but also depends on, better health.”
So how is the world doing?
Despite the United Nations declaring this international effort “the most successful anti-poverty movement in history,” success is also a much more daunting task than the optimistic planners imagined. Since 2015, the MDGs morphed into the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals with 17 points and a more realistic target accomplishment date of 2030.
And why is that? Well, it’s just plain difficult to create a peaceable, equitable, egalitarian world system that dignifies the life of every human on the planet. Huge progress has been made in four out of the eight MDGs; extreme poverty levels, for instance, have been almost halved globally. Gender disparity goals in education were nearly met, new HIV infection levels were reduced by 40 percent and the world did reach the goal on access to safe drinking water. However, unprecedented weather crises, rising conflict causing unanticipated migration patterns, the lack of high-level technology in many places for data gathering and more defeated the optimistic intents of the planner.
With all this as a background, now let’s focus on Millennium Development Goal #8, “to develop a global partnership for development.”
How have faith-based organizations impacted health initiatives in the modern era? The backstory to these simple seven words in goal #8 contains an excellent, if not elegant, example of the interaction of faith-based theology and compassionate intent on the policy-making behind the World Health Organization’s vital Declaration, which many world-watchers consider a watershed in the history of international development. This is a story that needs to be told and understood because it provides a map to effectuate more positive results to a world in crisis.
It Takes Only One Mosquito — to lead to remarkable truths about faith-based organizations and world health:Part 2 | Part 3
“The last decade has seen a significant transition in the ways that countries are responding to malaria,” Dr. David Reddy, CEO of the partnership, Medicines for Malaria Venture, said in a 2015 interview. “Significant new international resources (including Global Fund and President’s Malaria Initiative) have been better mobilized in the last 10–15 years to support programmatic strengthening and introduce greatly improved tools to prevent and treat malaria.”[
This news came on the heels of a story by Joshua Carroll in The Guardian newspaper about Myanmar becoming an example in the fight against malaria. It chronicled how thousands of volunteers received training and supplies from donors after political reforms opened the door for a flood of aid.
In the seemingly never-ending quest to wipe out malaria—responsible in 2019 for the deaths of more than 400,000 people worldwide, roughly equivalent to wiping out the entire population of Miami, Florida—scientists are experimenting continually with new ideas to combat “the enemy” … the pesky mosquito.[
Since 2010, GFA has distributed more than 1.3 million nets to at-risk residents in mosquito-prone areas, including 380,000 in 2019 (many are treated with insecticide, with availability depending on local conditions).
These efforts are augmented by distribution of malaria pills at GFA’s medical camps. In 2019 the organization hosted nearly 1,300 camps, which are free to attendees.
One of the specific health ministries 
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In