Barbara Lee Commemorates World Malaria Day
For Immediate Release
April 23, 2009
Contact: Nicole Y. Williams
(202) 225-2661
Washington, D.C. – Today, Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA) released the following statement on World Malaria Day which will be commemorated this year on April 25, 2009:
“Across the globe, 350-500 million people suffer from malaria every year, a million of whom die from their illness- mostly infants, young children and pregnant women. Additionally, in the developing world, HIV/AIDS is often compounded by co-infection with malaria. Due to a lack of available drugs to treat this diseases, malaria along with tuberculosis are the leading killers of people living with HIV/AIDS. The statistics are devastating.
“During the last Congress I co-authored the United States Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008, which reauthorized our global AIDS, TB and Malaria programs authorized $5 billion in funding for bilateral malaria initiatives over the next five years. It was an important step forward, but we must continue our fight.
“While our nation has already made a great commitment to combat this disease globally, we must do more. Over the next two years we have the opportunity to save a million lives by rapidly delivering malaria interventions - protective nets, diagnostic tests, antimalarial drugs and indoors spraying - to all people at risk of the disease and to pave the way towards virtually ending deaths by 2015.
“I encourage everyone to learn more about the deadly impact of malaria on the global AIDS pandemic on the developing world and continue to advocate for increased funding for bilateral malaria programs through the President’s Malaria Initiative and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. With your help we can stop these diseases and save the lives of millions of people.”
Malaria is a deadly mosquito-born disease, which takes almost one million lives per year and afflicts as many as half a billion people in 109 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America. In 2008 the Roll Back Malaria (RBM) Partnership unveiled the Globala Malaria Action Plan, which clearly sets out what needs to be done to meet the short, medium and long term goals of malaria control, elimination and eventual eradication.
On World Malaria Day, the Roll Back Malaria (RBM) Partnership will kick-start its "Counting Malaria Out" campaign. This 2-year campaign will intensify global efforts to reach the first important malaria milestone by 2010 and to strengthen systems in endemic countries for the long haul of sustained malaria control and elimination. The "Counting Malaria Out" campaign calls on malaria endemic countries, RBM partners and donors to put extra efforts into comprehensively tracking progress along the way to universal coverage by 2010, near-zero deaths by 2015 and the gradual elimination of malaria. To learn more about World Malaria Day visit http://www.rbm.who.int/worldmalariaday.
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