Ghana Reports 98% Drop in Malaria Deaths Since 2011

Summary

Ghana Health Service reported a 98% fall in malaria deaths since 2011, down to 52 deaths this year
Child malaria deaths fell 76% over the past three years, according to the same report
Ghana was the first country to approve the Oxford-developed R21/Matrix-M vaccine, in April 2023
The country still records more than 5 million malaria cases a year despite the drop in deaths
Ghana plans a domestic fund, the End Malaria Council, as international aid for the disease shrinks

Ghana's health authorities say malaria deaths fell from 3,259 in 2011 to 52 this year, crediting bed nets, spraying, preventive medicine and two vaccines developed in part at Oxford University.

Ghana’s health authorities say the country has cut malaria deaths by 98 percent in under fifteen years, a decline that would mark one of the steepest reductions in the disease’s toll anywhere in the world. According to the Ghana Health Service, as reported by good-news.io, deaths fell from 3,259 in 2011 to 52 this year. Child deaths from malaria dropped 76 percent over just the last three years.

The figures were reportedly announced around World Malaria Day in late April. They have not yet been independently confirmed by a second outlet, and should be treated as preliminary until verified against a primary Ghana Health Service or World Health Organization release. Still, they fit a longer pattern of progress that international health bodies have tracked for years.

A layered strategy, plus two vaccines

Ghana’s government attributes the decline to a combination of long-standing measures: insecticide-treated bed nets, indoor spraying of homes, and seasonal preventive medicine given to young children during the rainy season, when mosquito-borne transmission peaks. These tools have underpinned malaria control across West Africa for over a decade.

What is newer is the vaccine rollout. In May 2019, Ghana became one of the first three countries in the world, alongside Kenya and Malawi, to pilot the RTS,S/Mosquirix vaccine. Then in April 2023, Ghana’s Food and Drugs Authority became the first regulator globally to approve a second vaccine, R21/Matrix-M, developed by the University of Oxford’s Jenner Institute and manufactured by the Serum Institute of India. It is given to children aged 5 to 36 months, the group at highest risk of dying from the disease, in a three-dose course. Early trial data cited in reporting put its efficacy at up to 80 percent, compared with roughly 60 percent for the earlier vaccine.

“The WHO can provide support, but it is not an approving institution. The FDA has the mandate as a regulator, and that is what we have done.” — Delese Darko, Chief Executive, Ghana Food and Drugs Authority, quoted by ABC News

Cases remain high even as deaths fall

The drop in deaths has not meant an end to malaria itself. Ghana still records more than 5 million cases a year, according to good-news.io, close to the 5.3 million cases and roughly 12,500 deaths the country logged in 2021, as reported by Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. Globally, malaria still kills an estimated 600,000 to 620,000 people a year, the large majority of them children in Africa, according to reporting from ABC News, Gavi and the BBC.

Ghana’s government is reportedly setting up a national End Malaria Council to raise domestic funding for the fight against the disease, as international aid for health programmes shrinks. The country is targeting fewer than 15 malaria deaths nationally a year by 2028, and aims to eliminate malaria transmission entirely in 21 districts of the capital, Accra, within the same timeframe.

This article was researched and drafted with AI assistance and reviewed by Lasse Pedersen before publication. How we use AI

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