The Lancet Infectious Diseases: 3.5 million extra untreated cases of malaria

As many as 10900 extra malaria deaths may have occurred in 2014 due to the disruption of healthcare services in the three countries in west Africa currently experiencing widespread Ebola virus outbreaks (Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia), with a further 3900 deaths resulting from the interruption of insecticide treated net (ITN) delivery, according to new modelling research published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal. These new estimates of malaria deaths that would have been prevented by health systems when functioning normally, suggest that the west African Ebola outbreak could have resulted in comparable number of malaria deaths as those due to Ebola itself (8981 by Feb 1, 2015). However, the findings also indicate that implementing mass drug administration (MDA) and ITN campaigns to coincide with the 2015 malaria transmission season in May/June could largely mitigate the impact of Ebola on malaria. “The ongoing Ebola epidemic in parts of west Africa largely overwhelmed...