Accra — Malaria Programme Managers, representatives of the West African Network for Vector Control (entomologists) and other regional actors are to meet in Accra, Ghana 27-29 July 2011 as part of efforts to develop the ECOWAS Strategic Plan for Malaria elimination in the region by 2015. The meeting organized by the ECOWAS Commission will also be an opportunity for Member States to undertake a field visit to explore Ghana's experience on the use of biolarvicides from Labiofam/Cuba.

There will be presentations on malaria experience of other Member States including Nigeria, as well as on the situation analysis and socio-economic impact of malaria, Strategic plan and Communication Strategy for malaria elimination in the ECOWAS region. The result of the meeting will contribute to the preparation of the Extraordinary meeting of Ministers of Health on Malaria Elimination in ECOWAS by 2015 as requested by the Assembly of Health Ministers Meeting held recently in Lome, Togo. Participants of the Accra meeting will include representatives of the World Health Organization (WHO), the West African Health Organization (WAHO), the African Network on Vector Resistance to Insecticides (ANVR) and the ECOWAS Bank for Investment and Development (EBID). Official statistics show that a child dies of malaria in Africa every 30 seconds. The situation is particularly telling in West Africa, where the disease poses a major public health problem and the principal cause of morbidity and mortality among children and pregnant women. In 2007, the African Union Conference of Ministers of Health launched the African Malaria Elimination Campaign towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.

At the ECOWAS level, the Assembly of Health Ministers which met in Yamoussoukro, Cote d'Ivoire on 24th July 2009, among others, resolved to keep malaria high on the world agenda; to support local production of anti-malaria drugs and products to fight the scourge; to use all resources to prevent malaria, achieve universal coverage, reduce malaria cases and deaths, and eliminate malaria, and on the long-run eradicate the disease from the region. To take forward the anti-malaria campaign, the ECOWAS Commission in 2009 signed two partnership agreements with Cuba and Venezuela respectively, under which Cuba is required to transfer the technology for the setting up of pharmaceutical plants for the production and application of biolarvicides for vector control, while Venezuela would provide financial support for the establishment of three pharmaceutical plants for the production of the biolarvicides in Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana and Nigeria. Other concrete regional measures in support of the Malaria Elimination Campaign in ECOWAS by 2015 included the establishment in 2010 of a Task Force headed by the President of the ECOWAS Commission and the development in June 2011 of an ECOWAS Strategic Plan for malaria elimination by 2015.

These would be followed by the signing in September 2011 of a Joint Technical and Financial Agreement for Malaria elimination; adoption of the Strategic Plan by ECOWAS Heads of by December 2011 and production of biannual review reports on the implementation of the Strategic Plan between January 2012 and December 2015 A Multi-sectoral Taskforce will also be established under the President of the ECOWAS Commission for effective Coordination and Monitoring of regional anti- malaria initiatives.