WHO call for urgent action to reduce monotherapies

In the past few weeks there has been an urgent call to action from global leaders to respond the threat of antimalarial drug resistance. The most recent announcements were released following a series of high level meetings in Sydney, Australia. 

Members of the Access to Quality Medicines and other Technologies Taskforce (AQMTF), which advises the Asia Pacific Leaders Malaria Alliance (APLMA), met to formulate recommendations to help improve the availability of and access to quality medicines, diagnostics and other products through cooperation across the Asia Pacific region.

The World Health Organization estimated that 207 million cases of malaria occurred in 2012, resulting in 627 000 deaths each year*. The majority of cases occurred in Africa, particularly among children under the age of five years. Of this total, the Asia Pacific region coped with an estimated 36 million malaria cases and around 49, 000 deaths in 2012. In addition to managing these significant numbers of patients, governments, Dr's and researchers are also working to combat the emergence of drug resistance in several regions of Southeast Asia.

Dr Walter Kazadi, WHO Regional Hub Coordinator, Emergency Response to Artemisinin Resistance (ERAR) in the Greater Mekong Subregion highlights one of the greatest threats to the global effort to eradicate malaria “Artemisinin, which has truly been a wonder drug, continues to be far too commonly used on its own for malaria treatment, accessed far too easily through private suppliers.”

He goes on to highlight the danger “Countries and health partners need to work on urgently to effectively ban monotherapies and help enforce such measures. Make no mistake – if artemisinin becomes ineffective, we will not only lose one of our most powerful weapons in the battle against malaria, it will be a global disaster.”

These message are clear. The experts are highlighting the need to work together to avoid access to monotherapies on a large scale, in favour of the most effective artemisinin combination therapies (ACTs), but they are also emphasising the overall threat of our most effective antimalarial drugs no longer combatting the deadly malaria parasites putting millions of lives at risk in Asia and Africa.

The Taskforce has agreed to meet again in June 2014, in Manila, Philippines, to finalise its recommendations before submitting a formal report to APLMA leaders in August 2014. We look forward to reading the final report.

Find out more about antimalarial drug resistance and WWARN's call to action.

Data source: *WHO World Malaria Report 2013

WHO source: WHO and regional malaria experts reiterate warning about drug resistance