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Assessing malaria disease burden: a
standard protocol needed
An Informal Consultation on Standard Protocol Development
for Estimating Malaria Disease Burden in SEA Region was organized in WHO
SEARO, New Delhi,
11-13 August, 2010.
The meeting was jointly organized by WHO/ SEARO and the National
Institute of Malaria Research (NIMR) of India. The meeting was inaugurated by Dr J.P.
Narain, Director Department of Communicable Diseases, WHO/ SEARO. Dr Katoch, Director-General, Indian
Council of Medical Research, India also graced the occasion along with the
field- research officers, Director,
National Vector Borne Disease Control, eminent malaria epidemiologists and
bio- statisticians. In the opening remarks, Dr J. P. Narain and Dr Katoch emphasized the urgent
need to develop a standard protocol to measure malaria disease burden in India and
other member countries of the Region in uniform way. This will help in better planning and
targeting interventions to the right population and areas, as well as improve
advocacy for malaria in the Region which has low visibility.
After deliberation, group arrived at the consensus to
adopt a standard methodology for estimating malaria cases and deaths that
should be applied by the member countries.
The group consented that malaria case estimate should be derived by
adjusting the reported malaria cases against reporting completeness and
against the population seeking treatment from outside the government health
facilities. Similarly, for deriving malaria mortality estimates, group agreed
that flat CfR rate (based on empirical studies in South-east
Asia Region) should be used.
The group also, emphasized the need to conduct operational research on
an alternative method by NMIR and others to validate the assumptions of the
protocol in the field to further refine the methodology for better estimation
and maintain uniformity for international comparison.
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