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Zimbabwe:
Malaria-prone districts to receive mosquito nets
Africa Fighting
Malaria (AFM)
June
27, 2006
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/EKOI-6R835U?OpenDocument&rc=1&cc=zwe
Harare - SEVERAL
malaria-prone areas throughout Zimbabwe will receive 100 000 mosquito
nets from Population
Services International (PSI) over the next six months.
PSI country director
Mr Michael Chommie said Mt Darwin, Rushinga, Gokwe North, Gokwe
South and Mudzi were some of the malaria-prone districts that would
receive the nets.
He was speaking
at a belated Africa Malaria Day commemoration at Dotito High School
in Mt Darwin at the weekend.
"In the next six
months we will distribute 15 200 nets to Mt Darwin, 8 800 to Rushinga,
14 800 to Gokwe North,
32 000 to Gokwe South, 3 700 to Mudzi and 9 000 to Mutoko," he said.
The nets would
be distributed through antenatal clinics to pregnant women and children
under five.
Pregnant women
and children under five are the worst vulnerable to malaria and
if they succumb to it chances of fatalities are high.
Government has
been, with the assistance of different partners, trying to ensure
that every pregnant woman andevery child in a malaria-prone area
has access to a mosquito net.
Besides in-door
residual spraying -- which is the spraying of homes with DDT and
ICON -- mosquito nets constitute the other component of efforts
to cut down on malaria cases and deaths.
Mr Chommie said
the nets were bought with funds from PSI headquarters and United
Nations Children's Fund.
"Our model for
Insecticide Treated Net (ITN) delivery is assisting the Ministry
of Health and Child Welfare to rapidly and cost-effectively achieve
the Abuja targets of covering 60 percent of pregnant women and children
under five with a net," he said.
To date PSI, which
manages ITN projects in 24 countries in Africa, Asia and South America
has distributed 64 200 nets to Gokwe North and South and 23 600
nets to Mudzi.
Malaria remains
the second leading cause of death in Africa, after HIV and Aids.
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