AB021. Malaria in rural northern Uganda: a household survey of Malaria infection rates and common prevention strategies
Abstract

AB021. Malaria in rural northern Uganda: a household survey of Malaria infection rates and common prevention strategies

Heather Wipfli, Sarah Phillips, Peninah Tumuhimbise, Kenneth Odur, Ally Koh, Kathy Lam, Maya Spencer, Valeria Flores-Cadena, Kayla Samimi, Abigail Kim

Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA

Correspondence to: Sarah Phillips. Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA. Email: sarahphi@usc.edu.

Background: Malaria continues to be one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa despite years of preventative efforts. While over 80% of Ugandans have access to mosquito nets, Uganda is one of six countries that account for over half of global malaria cases (World Health Organization, 2019. World malaria report 2019. World Health Organization. https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/330011. License: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO). Pregnant women are particularly vulnerable to malaria, due to increased susceptibility and reduced treatment options, making them a population of interest. This survey of 512 households assessed the efficacy and usage of tools commonly used in malaria prevention, namely mosquito nets and insecticides.

Methods: In collaboration with the Peace Corps, community member volunteers aged 18–22, trained by Ray United Foundation Corp workers, distributed PC-provided mosquito nets and conducted surveys following receipt of consent from the heads of each household. Analysis was conducted in Qualtrics.

Results: Of 512 households, 154 males and 179 females, 333/512 (65.03%) households, reported having malaria in the past six months; 187/330 (56.66%) used insecticides 2–3 times per year. Of 508 households, 475 (93.2%) reported it was extremely difficult to access insecticides 430/510 (84.32%) said they knew how to properly hang and use a mosquito net, and 311/475 (65.47%) had malaria in the past six months. Of 511 households, 71 had a pregnant woman (13.89%) and 54/71 (76.05%) reported having malaria.

Conclusions: The majority of the households that had reported having malaria in the past six months also had access to mosquito nets, suggesting that net access alone isn’t sufficient for malaria reduction. Insecticide access is another challenge, for reasons such as availability and high cost. Persistently high infection rates, particularly among pregnant women, suggest that new strategies are needed to reduce the burden of malaria in Uganda.

Keywords: Malaria; mosquito net; insecticide

Acknowledgments

Funding: None.

Footnote

Conflicts of Interest: The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.

Ethical Statement: The authors are accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Open Access Statement: This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which permits the non-commercial replication and distribution of the article with the strict proviso that no changes or edits are made and the original work is properly cited (including links to both the formal publication through the relevant DOI and the license). See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.

doi: 10.21037/jphe-21-ab021
Cite this abstract as: Wipfli H, Phillips S, Tumuhimbise P, Odur K, Koh A, Lam K, Spencer M, Flores-Cadena V, Samimi K, Kim A. AB021. Malaria in rural northern Uganda: a household survey of Malaria infection rates and common prevention strategies. J Public Health Emerg 2021;5:AB021.

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