Note that those graphs of malaria cases and malaria deaths by year effectively have pretty wide error bars, with diferent sources disagreeing by a lot:
Presumably measurement methodology has improved some since 2010 but the above still suggests that the underlying reality is difficult enough to measure that one should not be too confident in a “malaria deaths have flatlined since 2015” narrative. But of course this supports your overall point regarding how much uncertainty there is about everything in this sort of context.
Great context, lexande! Relatedly, below is the disease burden per capita from malaria for a age-standardised population, and respective uncertainty[1]. There seems to be a stabilisation from 2017 to 2019, but this period is only 2 years. I assume the higher values in 2020 and 2021 were caused by COVID-19.
From page 18: ”Between 2000 and 2019, case incidence in the WHO African Region decreased from 370 to 226 per 1000 population at risk, but increased to 232 per 1000 population at risk in 2020, mainly because of disruptions to services during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2022, case incidence declined to 223 per 1000 population at risk.”
This is an argument for the effectiveness of existing interventions.
Note that those graphs of malaria cases and malaria deaths by year effectively have pretty wide error bars, with diferent sources disagreeing by a lot:
(source)
Presumably measurement methodology has improved some since 2010 but the above still suggests that the underlying reality is difficult enough to measure that one should not be too confident in a “malaria deaths have flatlined since 2015” narrative. But of course this supports your overall point regarding how much uncertainty there is about everything in this sort of context.
Great context, lexande! Relatedly, below is the disease burden per capita from malaria for a age-standardised population, and respective uncertainty[1]. There seems to be a stabilisation from 2017 to 2019, but this period is only 2 years. I assume the higher values in 2020 and 2021 were caused by COVID-19.
I guess the shaded area respects the 90 % or 95 % confidence interval. I did not quickly find information about this.
WHO claims the bump is due to covid-19 disruptions in world malaria report 2023.
From page 18:
”Between 2000 and 2019, case incidence in the WHO African Region decreased from 370 to 226 per 1000 population at risk, but increased to 232 per 1000 population at risk in 2020, mainly because of disruptions to services during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2022, case incidence declined to 223 per 1000 population at risk.”
This is an argument for the effectiveness of existing interventions.