A Time to Commemorate and Recalibrate

As we enter a new decade, I am pleased to share a bit of good news: This year, the global health community will see the distribution of the 2 billionth insecticide-treated bed net.

What is all the fuss about a bed net? Quite simply, bed nets have helped save over 7 million lives and averted over 1 billion cases of malaria. Bed nets contributed to one of the greatest successes in global health—and that is worthy of commemoration.

In global health, we rarely get a “silver bullet”, and we must rely on all the tools at our disposal to achieve hard won gains against formidable obstacles. In the case of malaria, a disease caused by a parasite living within and transmitted by anopheles mosquitos, half of the world’s population remains at risk of contracting the disease—most of whom live in parts of the world with limited access to strong health systems capable of addressing this preventable and treatable disease.

That is why insecticide-treated bed nets are so noteworthy. When used properly, one bed net can last up to 3 years and protect two people simultaneously. Moreover, bed nets are also incredibly cost-effective. Between 2006 and 2017, the bed net market increased fivefold with prices falling from approximately $4.50 to $2, greatly increasing value for money and significantly expanding net coverage from 5.5 million in 2004 to almost 200 million in 2018. Better still, bed net usage doubled between 2010 and 2018 among some of the most vulnerable to malaria, including pregnant women and children under 5.

This herculean effort did not occur by chance. We owe gratitude to several key partners who committed to scaling distribution of bed nets across the globe. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and the U.S. President’s Malaria Initiative (PMI) worked collaboratively with malaria-endemic countries and partners to distribute 1.3 billion and 400 million bed nets, respectively. Many other key partners, including The World Health Organization, the UK Government, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, The World Bank, UNICEF, and the UN Foundation’s Nothing But Nets initiative, among others, also contributed to the 2 billion net milestone.

Despite this milestone, the fight against malaria is not over. Every 2 minutes a child dies from malaria. We must recalibrate our approach to sharpen our focus and expand coverage of insecticide treated bed nets to those who still lack access and are at greatest risk of contracting malaria, most of whom live in sub-Saharan Africa. We must also broaden our toolbox of treatment and prevention options by investing in innovative, new technologies, which will include new types of bed nets treated with novel insecticides to combat insecticide resistance—and bringing them to market with concerted haste.

As we commemorate this milestone, let us also recommit ourselves to fighting malaria with everything we’ve got. This new decade must be one of accelerated action to meet our ambitious, but achievable global health goals—and see an end to malaria for good. I trust we have the collective resolve to do just that.