UN Health Agency Warns of Threat From Rising Anti-Malarial Drug Resistance in Asia-Pacific Region
New York, Nov 2 2012 5:10PM Growing resistance to a key anti-malarial drug derived from a shrub used in traditional
Chinese medicine is threatening to roll back gains made in combating the disease, a United Nations-backed health
conference that concluded today in Sydney, Australia, has heard.
Delegates at the ‘Malaria 2012: Saving Lives in the Asia-Pacific’ conference emphasized the importance of strong
political leadership and regional coordination after discussing resistance to artemisinin-based combination therapies
(ACTs) among challenges in the region’s fight against the disease, the international anti-malaria network Roll Back
Malaria Partnership (RBM) said in a <"http://rollbackmalaria.org/globaladvocacy/pr2012-11-02.html">press release on the event.
“Anti-malarial drug resistance is one of the greatest challenges to continued success in controlling and eliminating
malaria in the Asia-Pacific,” the Director of the Global Malaria Programme of the UN World Health Organization (WHO),
Dr. Robert Newman, told the gathering, according to the release.
“There is an urgent need for coordinated action against this public health threat, as called for in the Global Plan for
Artemisinin Resistance Containment,” he added, in reference to WHO’s proposals for mobilizing global efforts to contain
and ultimately eliminate artemisinin resistance where it has emerged.
Malaria, which is caused by a parasite transmitted to humans through the bites of infected mosquitoes, infects some 216
million people and kills nearly 650,000 people around the world every year, with most of the deaths occurring in Africa.
According to WHO, ACT therapies based on artemisinin – an extract from the sweet wormwood bush used for centuries in
Chinese medicine as a fever cure – were designed as combinations of two effective drugs with different modes of action.
WHO adds it was thought that they would be effective for many years. However, studies in recent years show that
resistance has begun to appear.
RBM said the Asia-Pacific region has traditionally been the epicentre for the emergence of drug-resistant malaria
parasites, and warns that a global spread of artemisinin resistance – or its independent emergence in other regions –
“could threaten the fragile gains of the last decade.”
Specifically, RBM noted, artemisinin resistance has been detected in Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam.
“It will be critical to galvanize political action and secure investments to implement an emergency response plan for
the Greater Mekong Subregion,” Dr. Newman told delegates, referring to the Southeast Asian river that passes through the
countries where artemisinin resistance has emerged.
The conference also saw the release of the study ‘Defeating Malaria in Asia, the Pacific, Americas, Middle East and
Europe,’ a joint WHO-RBM initiative that serves as the first report to shine a light on the progress and challenges in
the fight against malaria in any region beyond Africa.
“Asia accounts for the second highest burden of malaria, second only to Africa,” said RBM Executive Director Dr.
Fatoumata Nafo-Traore.
“In the face of persistent economic uncertainty and profound changes in the landscape of global development aid, the
region needs strong political leadership,” she too emphasized, adding, that it should also “develop financing strategies
that include substantive and sustained domestic investment, traditional multilateral and bilateral aid and truly
innovative sources of funding,”
Some 34 million cases of malaria claimed the lives of 46,000 people in the regions beyond Africa in 2010, according to
the report.
The Asia-Pacific region, which includes 20 malaria-endemic countries, accounted for about 88 per cent (30 million) of
these cases, and 91 per cent (42,000) of the deaths, the report adds, saying India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Myanmar and
Papua New Guinea bear the largest burden of the disease.
The RBM Partnership was launched in 1998 by WHO, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the UN Development Programme (UNDP)
and the World Bank, in an effort to provide a coordinated global response to the disease.
A global framework to implement coordinated action against malaria, it is comprised of more than 500 partners, including
malaria endemic countries, their bilateral and multilateral development partners, the private sector, nongovernmental
and community-based organizations, foundations, and research and academic institutions.
Nov 2 2012 5:10PM