By Sarah Long
14 February 2008 [MEDIAGLOBAL]: The United Nations Secretary-General has appointed Ray Chambers, an American philanthropist and humanitarian, as the UN’s first-ever Special Envoy for Malaria.
In creating this new appointment, Chambers said, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is demonstrating his commitment to addressing malaria, which, despite the existence of medical technology to control it, still kills one million people each year and affects 350 to 500 million more.
Chambers is hopeful that this appointment will give him a platform from which to implement meaningful changes and address the epidemic. “Having the full force and support of the Secretary-General and the United Nations is likely to increase the potential for raising awareness and funding to accomplish the objective of defeating malaria,” he told MediaGlobal.
The World Health Organization (WHO), the UN’s authoritative voice on health, applauded the appointment. “We are at pivotal moment in the fight against malaria,” said Dr. Margaret Chan, Director General of the WHO. “Ray Chambers has the passion, experience and commitment the world needs right now to secure political will and the funds to profoundly reduce this threat.”
While much of Chambers’ work has focused on at-risk youth in the U.S, he is also the founder and co-chairman of Malaria No More, a non-profit organization devoted to raising the profile of malaria among both the private and public sectors, and as well as in society at large.
Because malaria is a disease primarily of the developing world, Chambers said, there is very little awareness in donor nations of the extent of the epidemic. While HIV/AIDS has an 81 percent awareness rate in the U.S., he told reporters at UN headquarters, malaria has an awareness rate of only 25 percent.
“While we’ve managed to solve malaria in much of the developed world, malaria continues to prey on the least developed countries—those that lack the resources to effectively fight back but are increasingly committed to doing so,” Chambers told MediaGlobal.
Ninety percent of malaria deaths occur in sub-Saharan Africa, mostly among infants, children and pregnant women. Malaria kills more children in Africa than any other disease—approximately 3,000 die every day.
While there is no cure for malaria, and no effective vaccines are currently available, the drugs and technologies necessary to control the disease do already exist. Simple measures such as sleeping under a bed net and spraying insecticides indoors can effectively control the mosquitoes that transmit malaria, thereby preventing infection. And for those already infected, the use of medications such as artemisinen therapy can help treat the illness, preventing mortality.
“A recent report by the WHO released just last week offers powerful evidence that malaria deaths can be reduced by more than half at the country scale with mass distribution of insecticide-treated mosquito nets and access to powerful new medicines,” Chambers told MediaGlobal. “In Ethiopia, malaria deaths dropped 51 percent and incidence dropped 60 percent within two years. In Rwanda, malaria deaths dropped a stunning 66 percent and incidence fell 64 percent within six months of these interventions.”
In essence, Chambers said, the vast majority of the one million annual deaths from malaria could be prevented. In his opinion, malaria amounts to a veritable “genocide of apathy.”
To put anti-malarial technologies in place, however, will require more funding.
Encouragingly, many global funding bodies are beginning to pay attention to the problem. With significant investments from groups such as the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, the World Bank, and the U.S. President’s Malaria Initiative, and private sector institutions such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, malaria funding is at an all-time high, having increased 300 percent in the last 3 years.
These commitments, however, total under US$1 billion, well short of the US$1.7- $2.2 billion the WHO estimates is needed per year to effectively control malaria in Africa.
This level of funding is needed not only because of the size of the epidemic, but also because of the particular difficulties medical workers face in delivering treatments and technologies to largely rural populations spread across sub-Saharan Africa.
Many sub-Saharan African nations lack sufficient health care infrastructure, or have health care systems that are under-funded and have been overstretched in dealing with other epidemics and illnesses, such as HIV/AIDS.
But these challenges are not insurmountable and should not deter aid, Chambers insisted. “The global health community has found innovative ways to distribute mosquito nets in recent years, piggybacking on vaccination and child health campaigns in addition to routine distribution systems,” he said. “In Mali last December, for instance, 2.2 million nets were distributed in less than a week, providing 95 percent coverage for children under five nationwide.”
Furthermore, Chambers added, by relieving the burden malaria places on the health systems of developing nations, overall care can be improved.
“In malaria-endemic Africa, malaria often accounts for up to 40 percent of outpatient attendance,” Chambers said. “That’s a lot of hospital beds, medicine, nurses, and other resources that could be freed up for other health problems.”
“If we could achieve close to zero mortality using the existing technology, that would be a great human achievement,” he added.