Ghana’s malaria research and media advocacy network has renewed calls for sustained investment in disease surveillance and public health messaging, warning that gains against mosquito-borne illness remain fragile even as new prevention tools become available.
The African Media and Malaria Research Network (AMMREN) issued the appeal in Accra to mark World Mosquito Day, observed annually on 20 August in honour of Sir Ronald Ross, the British physician who discovered in 1897 that female Anopheles mosquitoes transmit the malaria parasite.
The organisation’s warning is grounded in the World Health Organization’s most recent global data. According to WHO’s World Malaria Report, the African region accounted for 94% of the world’s estimated malaria cases and 95% of malaria deaths in 2024, with children under five accounting for roughly three-quarters of deaths in the region.
Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Niger together accounted for more than half of regional deaths.
A shifting threat
AMMREN’s Executive Secretary, Dr Charity Binka, argued that the disease burden is evolving even as tools to fight it improve. The statement cites three specific pressures on control programmes: growing insecticide resistance among mosquito populations, changing environmental and climatic conditions that affect mosquito breeding and range, and the spread of invasive mosquito species into new territories.
These claims align with findings independently reported in WHO’s 2024 report, which documented confirmed artemisinin partial drug resistance in Eritrea, Rwanda, Uganda and Tanzania, with resistance suspected in several other African countries, though AMMREN’s statement addresses insecticide resistance specifically, a related but distinct phenomenon affecting vector control rather than drug treatment.
Set against these challenges, the network points to newer interventions like malaria vaccines and improved vector-control methods as having expanded what disease programmes can achieve. It did not specify which vaccines or vector-control tools, so the claim should be read as a general statement of AMMREN’s position rather than a specific technical assessment.
Beyond malaria, the statement notes that mosquitoes also transmit dengue, yellow fever and chikungunya, framing vector control as relevant to a wider set of diseases circulating on the continent.
Three priorities
AMMREN’s statement sets out three areas it wants prioritised: continued investment in surveillance and research and development; community-centred prevention efforts, including access to protective tools and timely care; and stronger health communication, with accurate information treated as a core part of disease control rather than a secondary concern.
“We must keep the science moving, but we must also ensure that people are not left behind. Accurate information is a powerful tool for prevention,” Binka said in the statement.
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