NB- this post is far from comprehensive. I’d appreciate people adding more information about the development of insecticide resistance in mosquitoes, or the speed of the malaria vaccine roll-outs in the comments.
Malaria vaccines.
We are now over a year into the launch of routine malaria vaccinations in Africa. GAVI has reported that 12 million doses of vaccines have been delivered to 17 countries. There are also very positive signs from the pilot, which ran from 2019-23 in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, as to the efficacy of the vaccine:
“Coordinated by WHO and funded by Gavi and partners, this pilot [run from 2019-23 in Kenya, Ghana and Malawi] reached over 2 million children, and demonstrated that the malaria vaccine led to a significant reduction in malaria illnesses, a 13% drop in overall child mortality and even higher reductions in hospitalizations.”
In effective altruism spaces, we often hear about specific, highly effective charities, such as the Against Malaria Foundation and the Malaria Consortium.
But these charities can run such specific and effective programmes because of the larger ecosystem of which they are a part. This ecosystem runs on funding from WHO member states and philanthropists, and involves organisations such as GAVI and the Global Fund. The funding sources of these organisations are at risk due to the foreign aid pause in the US, and (to a lesser, but still significant extent) foreign aid cuts in the UK.
Additionally, services provided by the President’s Malaria Initiative (PMI) were paused by the Trump administration. Despite waivers, it’s hard to figure out how many people have and will be affected by the pause, and whether people are receiving the treatment they need. As of March, these cuts were affecting the Against Malaria Foundation.
If you’d like to take a moment to reflect on this, my colleague Frances Lorenz’s short fiction piece is helpful (though it’s technically about PEPFAR and HIV, the story is the same for Malaria).
World Malaria Day 2025: what’s new, what’s not
Another year, another World Malaria Day.
WHO reports that an estimated 263 million cases and 597 000 malaria deaths occurred worldwide in 2023, with 95% of the deaths occuring in Africa.
What’s still the case:
Malaria is still one of the top five causes of death for children under 5.
The Our World In Data page on Malaria is still a fantastic resource to learn about Malaria.
What’s different this year:
NB- this post is far from comprehensive. I’d appreciate people adding more information about the development of insecticide resistance in mosquitoes, or the speed of the malaria vaccine roll-outs in the comments.
Malaria vaccines.
We are now over a year into the launch of routine malaria vaccinations in Africa. GAVI has reported that 12 million doses of vaccines have been delivered to 17 countries. There are also very positive signs from the pilot, which ran from 2019-23 in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, as to the efficacy of the vaccine:
“Coordinated by WHO and funded by Gavi and partners, this pilot [run from 2019-23 in Kenya, Ghana and Malawi] reached over 2 million children, and demonstrated that the malaria vaccine led to a significant reduction in malaria illnesses, a 13% drop in overall child mortality and even higher reductions in hospitalizations.”
Read more on GAVI’s website.
Cuts to foreign aid
In effective altruism spaces, we often hear about specific, highly effective charities, such as the Against Malaria Foundation and the Malaria Consortium.
But these charities can run such specific and effective programmes because of the larger ecosystem of which they are a part. This ecosystem runs on funding from WHO member states and philanthropists, and involves organisations such as GAVI and the Global Fund. The funding sources of these organisations are at risk due to the foreign aid pause in the US, and (to a lesser, but still significant extent) foreign aid cuts in the UK.
Additionally, services provided by the President’s Malaria Initiative (PMI) were paused by the Trump administration. Despite waivers, it’s hard to figure out how many people have and will be affected by the pause, and whether people are receiving the treatment they need. As of March, these cuts were affecting the Against Malaria Foundation.
If you’d like to take a moment to reflect on this, my colleague Frances Lorenz’s short fiction piece is helpful (though it’s technically about PEPFAR and HIV, the story is the same for Malaria).
If you want to do something right now, you can donate to AMF or the Malaria Consortium.