10 Oct 2018

Ngami District Health Management Team (DHMT) has launched the Indoor Residual Spray (IRS) campaign in an effort to tackle the malaria epidemic in the district.

The annual campaign is expected to run from October to December and health officials have appealed for the public to get ready for the exercise and to cooperate with the spraying teams.

The spraying kills the mosquito which causes malaria and in previous years it was reported that spraying teams were faced with lack of cooperation from communities as some people refused to open their houses.

Principal health education technical officer, Ms Goganaone Setutu revealed that this year they had engaged three teams to conduct the exercise in thee district, adding that the spraying would target all villages in the district except

Maun and Phuduhudu which would be given mosquito nets.

She also revealed that different languages spoken in the district would be used in an effort to promote IRS coverage within communities.

“IRS coverage remains a challenge in the district as most communities are not cooperative during the campaign, and we believe that the strategy of using indigenous languages will be the best communication tool, as the communities will easily understand information and the importance of IRS,” she said.

Ms Setutu said as part of their mobilisation activities, they had decided to conduct community conversations through sport tournaments and road shows with one of their brand mechanism written ‘open the door’ in different languages used in the district.

She said last year their schedule was affected by heavy rains, and that this year the campaign would go smoothly and end on time.

Another strategy, she said, was to work collaboratively with Okavango DHMT to ensure community knowledge and participation during the epidemic period.

Malaria focal person, Dr Basiame Mathaio explained that prevention of the disease remained a priority with strategies aimed at vector control.

For the transmission period of 2016, he said the district achieved its target and experienced high cases of malaria in 2017, adding that this year they were on track to achieve the set 85 per cent target of eliminating malaria.

He said there were no deaths recorded this year as compared to last year where one death was registered. The high number of cases in 2017, he said, was influenced by heavy rains and  that Okavango District was highly affected.

He also stated that most of the recorded cases were imported from areas of Okavango and neighbouring countries such as South Africa, Zambia and Namibia.

“This year we have also recorded imported cases from Zambia, Mozambique, Namibia while locally more cases were from areas of Mababe, Khwai and Maun,” he said.

Dr Mathaio noted that males aged between 25 and 29 were the most affected as compared to females while six cases of under five years were also registered. Ends