A global malaria prevention scorecard will be launched tomorrow in New York. It indicates that Rwanda has scored highly and shows that the country is on track in the fight against the disease.

The scorecard is a product of the African Leaders Malaria Alliance (ALMA). According to the scorecard, Rwanda did exceptionally well in the areas of mosquito nets rollout by 2011, Artemisinin based combination Therapy financing and scaling up Insecticide Treated Mosquito Nets.

While Rwanda scored 100 of the projection in the sectors of; mosquito nets rollout by 2011, Artemisinin-based Combination Therapy (ACT) financing and scaling up Insecticide-Treated mosquito Net (ITN), in the area of Rapid Diagnostic Test (RDT) financing projection score, the performance is still wanting.

Overall, the scorecard indicates that Rwanda has rolled out interventions that have helped reduce malaria infections and deaths. This is a milestone in the struggle against this leading cause of deaths in most of sub Sahara Africa.

International funding for anti malaria interventions, has helped to sustain the fight. Importantly, the government has played a leading role in implementing these interventions and as a result malaria cases or deaths have fallen by over 60 per cent.

It is imperative to sustain sensitization campaign, since it is the primary means of equipping people with information about malaria prevention.

Health care outreach programmes will ensure that those who get malaria are able to get rapid diagnosis and early treatment.

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