South-East African Regional Centre

• MARC SE-Africa brings together clinical researchers with expertise in implementation research, malaria chemotherapy and health policy, national malaria programmes and end users. Together we will improve estimates of antimalarial drug resistance and co-design a costed, Regional and Locally-Adapted Detailed Action Plans to respond promptly to emerging antimalarial drug resistance. Dynamically-updated, evidence-based malaria treatment guidelines and graphic evidence summaries using MAGICapp will be developed, disseminated and evaluated.

• Provide up to date systematic reviews on clinical and molecular evidence of antimalarial drug efficacy / resistance across our region, complementing similar efforts in other regions.

• Build, pilot test and support antimalarial drug efficacy surveillance such as WWARN Smart Surveillance, particularly in regional initiatives (such as Malaria Elimination 8 (E8)  and MOZASWA) and countries in our region working towards malaria elimination (including South Africa, Botswana, Swaziland, Zanzibar and Madagascar). This complements similar efforts including in the Horn of Africa and across South-East Asia, with skills and evidence sharing to further strengthen elimination efforts.

• Lead the WWARN Pharmacology Scientific Group hosted by the University of Cape Town MRC Collaborating Centre for Optimising Antimalarial Therapy (CCOAT), which complements the work of the WWARN Pharmacometrics Scientific Group and WWARN External Quality Analysis Programmes hosted by the Mahidol Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Unit in Bangkok.
• Contribute to WWARN multi-disciplinary Study Group activities including analyses to inform optimal malari treatment in vulnerable sub-populations (including malnourished young children, ACT safety  and  tolerability, and malaria transmission blocking with single low dose primaquine.
• Support capacity building activities with a focus on:
  • Training WHO TDR Clinical Research Leadership Fellows from across our region in generating and synthesizing relevant evidence to inform optimal malaria treatment.
  • Expanding the available Tools and Resources needed to meet the needs of those collecting data needed to understand and tackle antimalarial resistance, with collaborators including The Global Health Network (TGHN).

The South-East African Regional Centre invites you to get involved in our activities, including how to create or join a Study Group, participate in advocacy and capacity building activities, or share your ideas for a partner meeting or conference. Please feel free to reach out to the WWARN Programme Manager at wwarn@wwarn.org or Prof Karen Barnes at karen.barnes@wwarn.org.