Geneva, 25 Feb-(ANA)-The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced that the emergence of artemisinin resistant parasites at the Thai-Cambodia border could seriously undermine global malaria control efforts achieved.
Surveillance systems and research studies supported by WHO to monitor antimalarial drug efficacy in countries are providing new evidence that parasites resistant to artemisinin have emerged along the border between Cambodia and Thailand where workers walk for miles every day to clear forests.
The risk that they may be infected with a drug-resistant form of malaria could set back recent successes to control the disease.
Huge strides have been made in the las t ten years to reduce the burden of malaria, one of the world's major killer diseases. Strong malaria control programs have helped lower infection rates in several countries.
The recent shift from failing drugs to the highly effective artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs) has been a breakthrough. Appropriate treatment with ACTs succeeds in more than 90% of cases.
However, malaria drug resistance now emerging along the Thai-Cambodia border threatens these gains, WHO said. (ANA)
Palestine/Drink