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EDITOR IN CHIEF- ABDULLAH BIN SALIM AL SHUEILI

Kenya’s malaria treatment comes home

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Isaiah Esipisu -


When it rains in Emusala village, a person sick with a fever can find it hard to get to the nearest health centre, which requires a trip along the slippery footpaths that lead to the nearest main road some 10 km away, in the heart of Western Kenya’s Kakamega County.


But if the fever spells the onset of malaria, rapid diagnosis and treatment are essential.


That’s where Nicholas Akhonya comes in. With the aid of a simple medical kit and his mobile phone, Akhonya, a trained community health volunteer, is able to diagnose villagers with malaria in their own homes, offer treatment, and refer acute cases and pregnant women to health facilities for specialised care.


Malaria cases are on the increase in Kenya, and experts attribute the upsurge to changes in the climate.


According to Dr James Emisiko, coordinator for the Division of Vector Borne and Neglected Tropical Diseases in Kakamega County, mosquitoes breed particularly well in stagnant water in warm temperatures.


The females feed on human blood in order to produce eggs, and if a mosquito carrying the malaria-causing plasmodium parasite bites a person, it is likely to infect them.


Kenya’s recent drought followed by sporadic rainfall in the middle of this year has created a perfect breeding environment for mosquitoes, Emisiko said.


The result is an upsurge of malaria cases, especially in the Western Kenya region and around Lake Victoria.


“The only way to control deaths from this life-threatening disease is to ensure all fever cases are tested wherever the patients are, malaria-positive cases (are) treated and all complicated cases referred to nearby health centres,” the doctor said.


To tackle the problem, for the past two years, county governments in malaria-prone areas have worked with non-governmental organisations to train community health volunteers to diagnose the disease in patients’ homes, using rapid diagnostic kits.


The volunteers then treat those who test positive, and refer complicated cases to the nearest health centre.


“In case of any complication, all I need is to have power on my mobile phone so that I can communicate with medical experts using the toll-free number for further advice,” said Akhonya, one of the volunteers.


According to Moses Makokha, clinical officer in charge of the Bumala-A sub-county health centre in Busia County, some malaria cases can be fatal little more than 24 hours after symptoms occur, especially in children below the age of five years and pregnant women.


In pregnant women, malaria can lead to miscarriage or other serious complications, Makokha said.


“It is always an easy disease to manage — but only if it is identified at the onset of the fever and treated immediately using the correct medication,” Makokha said.


Kakamega County’s government has trained 4,200 community health volunteers to manage simple malaria, working with Community Asset Building and Development (CABDA), a local NGO, and with support from Amref Health Africa, an international Kenyan medical charity headquartered in Nairobi.


The volunteers are supplied with test kits and basic drugs to treat the disease at no cost to patients.


— Thomson Reuters Foundation


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