Cape Verde has become the fourth country in Africa and the 44th in the world to eliminate malaria.
Africa has the highest number of cases of the mosquito-borne disease in the world. In 2022, 94% of the 249 million cases globally and 95% of deaths were recorded on the continent.
Algeria, Morocco and Mauritius were certified malaria-free in 2019, 2010 and 1973 respectively.
Cape Verde regularly experienced severe epidemics across all the archipelago’s 10 islands. However, since the 1980s, malaria had been confined to only two islands, Santiago and Boa Vista, both of which have not recorded cases since 2017.
The WHO said on Friday the country’s “long journey” to elimination included free treatment and testing for all new arrivals and systematic surveillance and mapping of mosquito breeding sites throughout the year. These structures will remain in place to help the country fight other mosquito-borne diseases such as dengue fever.
“I salute the government and people of Cape Verde for their unwavering commitment and resilience in their journey to eliminating malaria,” said WHO director general, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “Cape Verde’s success is the latest in the global fight against malaria, and gives us hope that with existing tools, as well as new ones including vaccines, we can dare to dream of a malaria-free world.”
The number of global cases of malaria remains significantly higher than before the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2022, the disease killed about 608,000 people , mostly children and pregnant women. The WHO estimates that between 2019 and 2021, 63,000 malaria deaths were caused by pandemic disruption of healthcare services.
Two vaccines have been approved to help combat the disease. The R21/Matrix-M was recommended for widespread use by the WHO last year and the RTS,S vaccine, endorsed by the agency in 2021, is being rolled out to 12 Africa countries over the next two years.
“The certification as a malaria-free country has a huge impact, and it’s taken a long time to get to this point,” said Cape Verde’s prime minister, Ulisses Correia e Silva. “In terms of the country’s external image, this is very good, both for tourism and for everyone else. The challenge that Cape Verde has overcome in the health system is being recognised.”
