‘Zero case’ record achieved by Sarangani in anti-malaria drive

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DAVAO CITY, Philippines – A private sector-backed effort made Sarangani malaria-free for the first time ever, the Sarangani provincial health office said.

In a report, Dr. Arvin Alejandro, the provincial health officer, said there has been no malaria case reported in 2013, a feat achieved by “inclusive initiatives” against the mosquito-borne disease.

The massive anti-malaria effort, backed by a P25-million fund from Pilipinas Shell Foundation Inc. – through the Global Fund – started in 2007 and steadily reduced the incidence of malaria in the seven-town province of about half a million people, Alejandro said.

“Cases gradually went down from 1,700 in 2006, 37 in 2010, 28 in 2011, four in 2012 until zero case in this year’s record,” he said.

Alejandro said the success of the province-wide anti-malaria effort could be credited to the active participation of villagers.

“The PHO strengthened local systems supporting malaria prevention, trained a lot of sprayers, identified houses and we always connect that with dengue (fever prevention) to make our work comprehensive.  We do not do it against malaria alone but we do it also against the mosquito borne-disease,” he said.

He added that dengue fever has not been so much of a problem in the province.

Alejandro said the task left for every Sarangan now would be to sustain not having malaria cases at all.

“In order to sustain the zero case record, the PHO has expanded the containment of the disease to adjacent barangays of other municipalities like parts of Palimbang in Sultan Kudarat and areas near Glan (in Sarangani) with identified transmission of cases,” he said.

Aside from malaria, Alejandro said the PHO would also strengthen event-based monitoring of all diseases under the Department of Health’s surveillance list.

“We don’t talk only about malaria. We don’t talk only about dengue fever, but we talk also of other diseases like measles, tetanus, and others,” he said.

As in the case of the anti-malaria campaign, Alejandro said the PHO would be banking on the active participation of villagers to prevent outbreaks of illnesses.

Sarangani province is known for its implementation of the government’s campaign on good governance.

It has been consistently named in the Galing Pook Awards.

In March, then Gov. Miguel Dominguez became the first recipient of the Jesse Robredo Leadership Award (JRLA) from the Galing Pook Foundation for “having shown effective, transparent, accountable, participatory, innovative and ethical leadership.”

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