Moving toward eradication: Malaria's next frontiers
June 2008
 Dr. Matt Lynch, Dr. Leslie Mancuso, Ms. Uzo Gilpin, Dr. Seth Owusu-Agyei and Ms. Elaine Roman. At the Global Health Council’s 35th annual conference, Jhpiego co-sponsored the roundtable discussion, "Moving toward Eradication: Malaria’s Next Frontiers." The event, also sponsored by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Center for Communications Programs (CCP) and PATH, examined scale-up of programs addressing malaria prevention and control, as well as investment in and needs of high-burden settings.
Dr. Leslie Mancuso, Jhpiego President and CEO, welcomed the attendees by stressing the organizations' dedication to battling this disease that kills tens of thousands of women and their families each year. "Working together to find solutions with the goal of elimination is important to all of us. That's why we are here. It cannot be done by one group, but can only be accomplished through a collective effort," said Mancuso.
The panel, moderated by Dr. Matt Lynch of CCP, included malaria experts Ms. Uzo Gilpin of the Society for Family Health in Nigeria and Population Services International, Ms. Elaine Roman of Jhpiego, and Dr. Seth Owusu-Agyei of the Kintampo Health Center and Ghana's Ministry of Health.
Roman, along with the other panelists, discussed challenges and victories in the fight against malaria. Specifically, she shared Jhpiego's efforts in Burkina Faso and Kenya, highlighting two of the most important lessons learned in the prevention of malaria—addressing the issue through the household-to-hospital continuum of care approach and engaging women earlier in their pregnancies. Dr. Owusu-Agyei shared his most troubling view about malaria, especially as it relates to children. "It is terrible to lose a child and worse to lose one to a preventable disease like malaria," he said.
Common themes emerged from all of the presentations—community members' participation is paramount in treating and preventing malaria, effective vaccines are essential and increased funding is needed. Jhpiego, PATH and CCP all agree that eradication is years away, but are committed to eliminating this deadly and preventable disease.
About Jhpiego
For nearly 40 years, Jhpiego, (pronounced "ja-pie-go"), has empowered front-line health
workers by designing and implementing simple, low-cost, hands-on solutions that
strengthen the delivery of health care services, following the
household-to-hospital continuum of care. We partner with community- to
national-level organizations to build sustainable, local capacity through
advocacy, policy and guidelines development, and quality and performance
improvement approaches.
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