Minister Aceng to donors: Stop profiteering from malaria

The Minister of Health, Dr Jane Ruth Aceng has warned donors to stop profiteering from the existence of malaria in Uganda.  

Without mentioning specific donors, Dr Aceng urged the donors to consider malaria a disease that kills people and support countries like Uganda that are still grappling with elimination of the disease.   

“There are people who are making money with malaria in Uganda. They (donors) look at it from a different perspective and think that they are helping when they develop new drugs and chemicals. Profiteering from a disease that’s killing people is not the way to go. Have a mindset change and understand that malaria is killing people,” Dr Aceng said.

She made these remarks on May 7 during a closed door meeting with partners from Malaria Consortium at the ministry of Health headquarters in Kampala. She added that the discussions at the meeting were intended to develop a malaria elimination and eradication strategy.  

“We need our country and population to be safe and alive. When we get rid of malaria, the fertility rates will go down and people will produce fewer children. The population wants to get out of poverty because many children are a burden for most families. It is time for everyone to do things right,” she said.

Dr Aceng’s call comes at a time when government efforts to reduce malaria prevalence in the country are instead taking a reverse trend.

She said malaria is not only a health but economic and social issue.

“It breaks economies. We can talk about economic growth but if we still have preventable diseases that consume a huge amount of government and household money, we shall not grow at the pace we would otherwise have grown. The data is not clear because there are people who die in communities and others in health centres,” she said.

According to Dr Aceng, Uganda in collaboration with partners, invests approximately $100million every year in the fight against malaria.

Dr James Tibenderana, the Global Chief Executive of Malaria Consortium said malaria elimination in Uganda needs to be reenergized because there is evidence to suggest that the country’s efforts have significantly reduced. 

“There are emerging threats such as drug and insecticide resistance. If we don’t rethink, rework and re-strategise the existing approaches, Uganda will continue on the same trajectory and things get worse. It is not acceptable,” Mr Tibenderana said.

Out of the top 10 countries that carry the burden of malaria in Africa, Uganda ranks third after Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo, for a relatively small population of 42 to 45 million.

“We are carrying a huge burden of children and expecting mothers dying of malaria. It is disproportionate for a small size of the country. There are figures between 40 to 60 percent of outpatients due to malaria and up to 40 percent of deaths of children under five related to malaria. This is not acceptable for a country that sees itself moving into a middle income economy. It is something we need to eliminate, otherwise, it will hold us back,” Dr Tibenderana said.  

According to the World Health Organisation, the WHO African Region continues to carry a disproportionately high share of the global malaria burden. In 2022, WHO says the region was home to about 94 percent of all malaria cases and 95 percent of deaths. Children under five years of age accounted for about 78 percent of all malaria deaths in the region.

Four African countries accounted for just over half of all malaria deaths worldwide, with Nigeria at 26.8 percent, the Democratic Republic of the Congo 12.3 percent, Uganda at 5.1 percent and Mozambique 4.2 percent. 

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