10,000 cases by year-end

Oct 12, 2009 News

Over $300M spent annually on Malaria…

By Fareeza Haniff

The Guyana government, through the Ministry of Health, spends approximately $300 to $400 million a year on malaria infections within the country.
But recorded malaria infections are expected to reach 10,000 by the end of the year, despite efforts to keep the figure to a minimum of 8,000.
This is according to Health Minister, Dr. Leslie Ramsammy, who noted that the bulk of this money goes towards maintaining health workers, conducting smears, testing and treating the infected.
The rest of the money goes towards purchasing medicines and bed nets, which are distributed free of cost to persons in the interior locations.

Minister of Health, Dr. Leslie Ramsammy

“It is a huge investment, given the fact that it is not (prevalent) throughout the country. We have not been able to have a local capacity that can do without a central capacity. So we had to maintain a large number of workers that we can send to support the local staff,” the Health Minister told Kaieteur News recently.
Dr. Ramsammy explained that Guyana is now far more advanced in treating the infection because diagnosis is now done before treatment.
At present, the Ministry of Health is having a difficult time controlling the malaria situation in the country.
The situation is one that is increasing on a daily basis, given the increased economic circumstances in Regions One, Two, Eight and Nine, where more mining activities are taking place.
According to the Health Minister, in many Amerindian communities, concessions are being given out by the villagers themselves.
In these areas, he noted that the way mining is done leaves breeding sites for the mosquitoes and this has proved to be a huge challenge for the Health Ministry. However, he added that the drivers of the epidemic are always one step ahead of the health workers.
“So every time we find an area and we bring some control, a new area opens up.”
Dr. Ramsammy is nevertheless happy to report that the malaria is responding to the drugs being used by his health workers.
Guyana currently uses a combination of drugs (combination therapy) to treat the virus. Minister Ramsammy said that the parasites have learnt how to deal with the drugs.
“If you challenge them one drug at a time, then it may get easier for them. The trick therefore is to zonk them with several medicines at the same time.”
Meanwhile, as strange as it is, Guyana does not have malaria deaths, Dr. Ramsammy said. He noted that there are persons who had malaria and died shortly after, but that does not mean that they died from the malaria itself.
“We don’t have malaria deaths. That’s the difference between us and Africa and in fact throughout the Americas. We don’t have too many deaths…there are deaths, but they are very few. In Guyana, we would have people dying who had malaria, but they didn’t necessarily die from malaria.”
According to the Health Minister, Guyana would usually have between five to seven people that would die in the year that would have had malaria at some time.
For the year so far, the Ministry of Health has recorded a total of 6,700 malaria cases.
Out of that number, 51 per cent of them are of the more serious type of malaria.
However, he said that though it is hoped that the figure will only reach around 8,000, he anticipates that it will climb to 10,000 by year-end.