Senegal

Malaria prevention and control is a major foreign assistance objective of the United States Government (USG). In May 2009, President Barack Obama announced the Global Health Initiative (GHI), a six-year, comprehensive effort to reduce the burden of disease and promote healthy communities and families around the world. Through the GHI, the United States will partner with countries to improve health outcomes, with a particular focus on improving the health of women, newborns, and children. The President's Malaria Initiative (PMI) is a core component of the GHI, along with human immunodeficiency virus /acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS), and tuberculosis. PMI was launched in June 2005 as a five-year, $1.2 billion initiative to rapidly scale up malaria prevention and treatment interventions and reduce malaria-related mortality by 50% in 15 high-burden countries in sub-Saharan Africa. With passage of the 2008 Lantos-Hyde Act, funding for PMI has been extended through fiscal year (FY) 2014 and, as part of the GHI, the goal of PMI has been adjusted to reduce malaria-related mortality by 70% in the original 15 countries by the end of 2015. Senegal was selected as a PMI country in 2006. Large-scale implementation of malaria control activities began in FY 2007 and progressed rapidly with significant progress demonstrated to date. This FY 2014 Malaria Operational Plan for Senegal was developed in close consultation with the National Malaria Control Program (NMCP) and with the participation of all national and international partners involved with malaria prevention and control in the country. The activities that PMI is proposing to support with FY 2014 funding fit well with the 2011-2015 National Malaria Control Strategic Plan and build on investments made by PMI and other partners to improve and expand malaria-related interventions over the last five years. This FY 2014 MOP is designed to support the objective set by the Government of Senegal and stakeholders to engage in the malaria pre-elimination phase, as data have demonstrated significantly reduced prevalence in many parts of the country. In line with GHI principles, PMI has reinforced its efforts to build capacity and integrate across programs. The proposed FY 2014 PMI budget for Senegal is $21.6 million, of which 43% will be managed directly by local entities/institutions. Senegal has a population estimated at 13.2 million in 2014, with approximately 2.2 million children less than five years of age and 528,000 pregnant women. Malaria is still a major cause of morbidity and mortality and a high priority for the government, even though the number of reported cases of malaria has dropped significantly since 2007-2008. While the decline in the first year can be partially ascribed to a change in the malaria case definition that now requires parasitological confirmation of all cases, the proportion of all outpatient visits due to confirmed malaria continued to fall, from 6% in 2008 to 3% in 2009. From July 2010 to March 2013, routine morbidity and mortality data were not available due to a health worker data retention strike. Now that the strike has ended, the Ministry of Health (MOH) is working to catch up with routine data collection for the missing years.