More malaria education needed this World Malaria Day

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Pharmaceutical Insights +

In this online exclusive, anti-malarial specialist, TravelPharm, and digital agency, Fifteen, reveal their research findings, which show that more work is needed in communicating malarial risks to travellers…

Immigrants and travellers returning home from visiting friends and relatives abroad (VFR travellers) top the list of travellers most at risk, with over 40% of all new cases being attributed to this group alone.

VFR travellers are the most challenging group with regards to malarial education, say anti-malarial specialists TravelPharm, and this World Malaria Day on April 25th should be used to engage communities about the subject.

This high rate of malaria among VFR travellers may arise for numerous reasons. It may be that many believe they do not require antimalarial treatments when travelling back to their country of origin. This group also travel for much longer periods of time than normal tourists and visit ‘local areas’ rather than ‘tourist areas’. VFR travellers may have a lack of trust around medical systems such as the NHS, or find that there are additional challenges, for example language barriers in the UK that could prevent them from getting correct information.

Recent works in the fight against malaria:

  • December 2016 — Catalent Biologics partners with Path Malaria Vaccine Initiative to accelerate development of malaria vaccines.
  • April 2017 — WHO reveals the three African countries to take part in malaria vaccine pilot programme due to start this year.
  • November 2017 — Cardiabase supporting WHO in fight against malaria by providing relevant and up-to-date information on the cardiotoxicity of antimalarial drugs when evaluating new malaria treatments in development.
  • April 2018 — PATH and Mologic partner to advance a new rapid diagnostic test to support the treatment and elimination of Plasmodium vivaxor relapsing malaria.

The most current data available demonstrates there were 1,270 cases of malaria treated in the UK alone (2016). Over half of all cases were from first and second-generation migrants in the UK, of which 81% were visiting their family in the country of origin. Others included foreign visitors who fell ill whilst in the UK, new entrants and a small percentage of foreign students studying in the UK.

The bulk of new cases were from visits to Africa, notably Western Africa as well as a notable number from Southern Asia. The British regions that were particularly affected were London, in which over half of the cases were diagnosed.

But research by TravelPharm shows that different ethnic groups of VFRs, who visit different continents, may also be returning to the UK with different malarial strains. Plasmodium vivax, which is found largely in Asia, was treated in hospitals with large Asian communities such as Birmingham Heartlands (12 P. vivaxcases treated), Liverpool (10 P. vivaxcases), and Bradford Royal Infirmary (five P. vivaxcases). The majority of cases treating the more dangerous strain of, Plasmodium falciparumwere found in London and imported from Africa.

In summary:

  • VFRs are the most significant group for bringing malarial strains back to the UK
  • Different ethnic groups are bringing back different strains, because of visiting families and relatives different countries
  • Those different strains are diagnosed in different parts of the UK accordingly
  • VFRs are a difficult group to reach — more needs to be done to reach out to these communities in order to educate about the preventative medication needed.

Sources:

  • Malaria imported into the United Kingdom: 2016
  • Malaria imported into the United Kingdom: 2015
  • Freedom of Information request with Public Health England