September 2005
4th MIM Pan-African Malaria Conference - Roll Back Malaria Partnership's Forum V Global Partners Meeting
Unprecedented international gathering in Cameroon to present new findings in malaria research and call for urgent action to subdue Africa’s most devastating killer
As malaria deaths remain at alarming levels in Africa - with a child succumbing every 30 seconds and the devastating disease a root cause of the continent's pervasive poverty - an unprecedented gathering will convene in Africa to highlight new findings emerging from the work of Western and African malaria researchers.
In mid-November, 1,500 scientists, policymakers, African ministers, health care workers, community members, and other experts on the diseases will gather in Yaoundé, Cameroon, for the Fourth MIM Pan-African Malaria Conference November 13 - 18 and the Roll Back Malaria Partnership's Forum V Global Partners Meeting November 18 - 19. The conferences will collectively highlight an Africa-wide effort to empower communities, battle complacency and eliminate the many barriers that are keeping effective prevention and treatment from reaching the most vulnerable. The Roll Back Malaria Partnership will report on a coordinated plan to reduce malaria deaths in Africa and worldwide. Journalist site visits to research projects and malaria endemic communities will be organized prior to the conference.
This assembly offers a unique opportunity to find in one venue the world's leading experts on all aspects of malaria from prevention to control and from basic research to program implementation, as they tackle pressing scientific, social and economic issues confronting efforts to subdue the disease. Issues to be addressed include: - New medicines for malaria: With drug resistance spreading, scientists report on new advances in drugs to control malaria.
- Indigenous plants as sources for new anti-malarials: Is there another Artemisia out there? Results of collection and screening efforts for anti-malarial agents in dozens of plants.
- Country level commitment to malaria control: Leadership and ownership are essential if malaria is to become no longer "a fact of life".
- Insecticide treated bed nets: Scientists know they're effective but research reveals a surprising ambivalence toward using them, even when cost is not a factor.
- Malaria vaccine development: Scientists report findings from clinical trials.
- Insecticide resistance: Scientists find new evidence of mosquitoes overcoming insecticides used in bed nets, such as DDT, and in other malaria control efforts.
- Unlocking the potential of the malaria genome: Decoding the parasite's DNA was a huge achievement. But is it leading scientists to new drugs and vaccines?
- Access to malaria commodities: Scaling up production to ensure 80% coverage with the most effective prevention and treatment in the next two years. Can this be done?
- Treatment as prevention: New evidence on how intermittent use of malaria medicines can prevent the disease and may even induce immunity in children and pregnant women
- HIV and malaria: Co-infection poses a major treatment challenge and scientists find evidence that malaria in pregnancy may facilitate fetal HIV transmission.
- Genetically engineered mosquitoes to control malaria: Is the transgenic mosquito ever going to fly? Scientists debate the risks and benefits.
- Sickle cell and malaria: Scientist probe why people with the sickle cell trait have natural malaria protection while those with sickle cell disease do not.
- Monitoring "adverse events" in Africa: What mechanisms are needed to ensure postmarket safety monitoring of new malaria drugs?
- Field-based reports from ten countries: Is malaria control working at the community level?
- Malaria and migration to the city: Research on the changing landscape of controlling malaria in an increasingly urbanized Africa.
- Africa's human resource drain: What is the impact of the mounting exodus of health workers and scientists on malaria research and control?
The Multilateral Initiative on Malaria (MIM) (www.mim.su.se), launched in Dakar, Senegal in 1997, is an international alliance of organizations and individuals seeking to maximize the impact of scientific research against malaria in Africa to ensure that research findings yield practical health benefits. The MIM Secretariat was previously hosted for 3-years terms by the Wellcome Trust (UK) and the Fogarty International Center at the National Institutes of Health (USA). In 2003, the Secretariat moved to Stockholm, Sweden, where it is hosted by the Karolinska Institute and Stockholm University.
To provide coordinated international approach to fighting malaria, the Roll Back Malaria Partnership (RBM) (www.rollbackmalaria.org) was launched in 1998 by the World Health Organization, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the World Bank. The Partnership now brings together governments of countries affected by malaria, their bilateral and multilateral development partners, the private sector, non-governmental and community-based organizations, foundations, and research and academic institutions around the common goal of halving the global burden of malaria by 2010. World Malaria Report 2005 (http://rbm.who.int/wmr2005/)
For further information and to register for the conference and/or site visits in Africa, please contact:
Cameroon
MIM, Wilfred Mbacham, T +237 757 91 80, [email protected]
Africa
Massive Effort London UK, Louis Da Gama, T +44 208 357 7413, M +44 7990 810642, [email protected]
Europe, Scandinavia and Asia
Good Company, Maria Dalayman T +46-8-545 805 54, M +46 70 685 40 05, [email protected]
France and Belgium
Michel Aublanc Conseils/Public-info, Michel Aublanc, T +33 1 69 286 286, M +33 6 08 719 795, [email protected]
UK
Peter Robbs Consultants Ltd, Cathy Bartley, T +44 (0) 207 635 1593, M +44 (0)79 58 56 16 71, [email protected]
US/Canada
Burness Communications, Ellen Wilson, T +1 301 652 1558, ext 108, M +1 301 922 4969, [email protected]
or visit our pressroom at www.mim.su.se/conference2005/eng/pressroom.html. For online registration please visit http://www.rollbackmalaria.org/forumV/pressinfo.htm.
You can also find information about malaria on the following links: PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative: www.malariavaccine.org, Medicines for Malaria Venture: www.mmv.org and Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases (TDR) World Health Organization: www.who.int/tdr