Bill Oakley
There are over 200,000,000 new cases of malaria every year, which result in the deaths of over 500,000 people per year - mostly pregnant women and children under 5 years of age. The chosen area of focus for Australian Rotary are the countries of PNG, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and Timor Leste.
Bill explained the process by which Malaria was spread by Mosquitoes, once a human is infected the disease can lie dormant and undetected for years, however uninfected mosquitoes can continue to catch and spread Malaria from biting people before symptoms develop. Our fight against malaria has involved trying to stop infected mosquitoes from biting humans by:
- killing them with sprays, poisons, mosquito coils etc.
- keeping them away from humans by removing potential breeding grounds
- putting barriers in the way such as mesh screens on windows, protective clothing, and bednets.
The other part of the cycle is to stop uninfected Mosquitoes biting infected humans through rapid diagnosis and treatment and removing infected people from mosquito prone areas.
The Holy Grail remains the finding of a cheap, effective, portable, long lasting vaccine.
RAM activities include:
- targetted bednet distributions to areas of high risk in Timor Leste
- the "Running Malaria Down" program in PNG which identifies malaria hotspots and directs resources to these areas
- A "Clean Up a Village" program in Solomon Islands where villages sign up
- Studies in Malaria and Mosquitoes in order to find a vaccine
RAM raises $150K per year in Australia but needs to increase this to $500K in the next year or two - about $20,000 from each District. Last year D9800 raised $12,700 making it one of the highest donors in Australia, although this represented donations rom only 7 clubs.
16-May-2017