Fighting Malaria Together Newsletter - August 2011

A cross-border initiative to eliminate malaria

Bertha Simwaka, Senior M&E Officer, MACEPA

The Trans-Zambezi Malaria Initiative is working to eliminate malaria along the regions bordering on the Zambezi River shared by Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Zambia.

Because mosquitoes and malaria parasites do not recognize national borders, sub-regional elimination of malaria must be based on multi-national frameworks. Countries that have made good overall progress in reducing malaria prevalence rates may have persistent challenges in reducing rates along borders with countries that have made limited progress. The Trans-Zambezi Malaria Initiative (TZMI) was launched in February 2011—with the support of the Roll Back Malaria Southern Africa Regional Network (SARN) Secretariat—to develop, document, and evaluate a comprehensive strategy to foster elimination of malaria in the border regions shared by Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Zambia. These countries are among the eight malaria elimination countries within the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region; Namibia and Botswana are among the front-runner countries for elimination. The ultimate goal of TZMI is to reduce malaria transmission to near-zero by 2013 and eliminate it in the TZMI districts by 2015.

Representatives of national malaria control programmes (including program managers and data managers) and partners (MACEPA; the SADC, SARN, and RBM Secretariats; Sanofi Aventis; Global Health Group; Malaria Institute at Macha; Akros Research) met in February 2011 to draft an action plan and outline a process and timeline for developing a business plan and map out critical interventions and systems for harmonization. This included developing tools for consolidating baseline data on malaria burden and interventions in the districts. At a follow-up meeting a few months later in Livingstone, participants drafted a joint TZMI action/operational plan, a plan to help districts harmonize and synchronize activities, and the TZMI business plan to support the alignment of activities. Emphasis was on active case detection; data management; baseline surveys; behavior change communication (BCC) and information, education, and communication (IEC); coordination.

The TZMI is still young, but implementation is rolling out rapidly. Roles and responsibilities of national programmes, districts, and partners have been established, and all districts are already consolidating baseline data on key malaria indicators using the standardized tool. Through harmonization of data collection using a rapid reporting system with mobile phones, the district-level epidemiological landscape is becoming better understood than ever. The rapid reporting system is being piloted in the Zambian TZMI districts, where district personnel are playing a key role; capacity-building to strengthen skills among data managers, community-based health workers, and others working at the community level is viewed as an important priority. Additional critical next steps in the near term include formalizing a Secretariat to serve as a support arm to TZMI, strengthening coordinating mechanisms to ensure information is quickly and routinely shared among all stakeholders, and ensuring that intervention coverage or surveillance gaps at the district level are rapidly identified and addressed.