Wellcome Trust, Professor Hilary Ranson, Professor Philip McCall, Dr Eve Worrall
Insecticide treated nets are the main tool used to prevent malaria transmission in Africa and their widespread use has led to dramatic decreases in malaria in some regions. However, in some high malaria burden countries, recent bednet distribution programmes have had less impact on disease transmission than predicted. One hypothesis is that insecticide resistance in the mosquito vectors is undermining the performance of bednets. In a new collaborative project, ‘Malaria in Insecticide Resistant Africa (MIRA), led by Professor Hilary Ranson, we will be using a transdisciplinary approach to evaluate the reasons for the poor performance of benets in Burkina Faso. We will be collecting extensive field data on bednet usage, access to treatment, malaria risk factors, mosquito ecology, behaviour and insecticide resistance and working with infectious disease modellers and health economists to understand the limitations of current malaria control tools in contemporary African settings and to propose an affordable solution to sustaining malaria control.