End Malaria Council, a group of international influential public and private sector leaders has launched a malaria eradication programme at Davos, Switzerland.
The Council is co-chaired by Mr Bill Gates, of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Mr Ray Chambers, the United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for Health in Agenda 2030 and for Malaria.
The launch, which took place on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland, was copied to the Ghana News Agency.
“The next chapter of the fight against malaria starts now,” said Gates, who co-authored a report with Chambers in 2015 called Aspiration to Action: What will it take to end malaria?
“For the first time in history, we have a roadmap to a world without malaria – where no one has to die from a mosquito bite ever again. With renewed focus, innovation and new commitments of leadership and funding, we can be the generation to end malaria once and for all.”
The launch of the End Malaria Council comes just a month after the release of the World Health Organisation’s 2016 World Malaria Report, which showed remarkable progress in reducing cases and deaths from malaria since 2000.
It also underscored the urgent need for global leadership, new funding and innovation to stay on track to meet targets.
Members of the End Malaria Council would work in collaboration with the Roll Back Malaria Partnership and other key partners to help countries and regions achieve their malaria control and elimination goals.
The group would use their voices and networks to support the work already underway by malaria field workers, scientists and experts by focusing on three areas: building political will, mobilising resources and supporting the development of new tools to find, prevent and treat malaria.
The nine founding Council members discussed strategies for filling critical financing gaps in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
The End Malaria Council will grow to represent all of the key malaria-endemic regions.
The other members of the inaugural committee are: Mr Peter Chernin, Founder, Chernin Entertainment and the Chernin Group, Mr Aliko Dangote, President/Chief Executive Officer, Dangote Group and Chadian President Idriss Deby, Representing the African Leaders Malaria Alliance.
The rest are; Former President Jakaya Kikwete, of Tanzania, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Mr Luis Alberto Moreno, President, Inter-American Development Bank and Mrs Gracia Machel, Founder, Foundation for Community Development, Mozambique.
The statement commended strong leadership, smart investments and the hard work of the public and private sectors to reduce the high incidence of malaria deaths by half since 2000 and saving more than six million lives from the disease.
It observed that malaria-related deaths were at an all-time low, especially among children under five in sub-Saharan Africa.
The statement attributed the achievement to the unprecedented delivery of more than 500 million insecticide-treated bed nets over the last three years, along with significant expansion of diagnosis and treatment.
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(Via: NewsGhana)
