"INESS will support AMMREN. We will act as midwives for AMMREN”, Dr. Hassan Mshinda said during a recent meeting of the AMMREN family in Tanzania. The Kunduchi Beach Hotel was the setting.

The occasion was a three-day media sensitization workshop on Malaria and the INDEPTH Effectiveness and Safety Studies of Anti-Malarials Project, (INESS) which gave birth to a new and bigger household- the AMMREN and INESS family. Dr Hassan Mshinda is the Principal Investigator of the INESS Project.

Dr. Hassan Mshinda making a point

It was like a family reunion at the plush and coastal Kunduchi Beach Hotel in Dar es Salaam when journalists from all the 10 AMMREN-member countries gathered to launch yet another attack against Africa's number one enemy - malaria.

There were handshakes and hugs as the 29 Journalists met. They were from Ghana, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Tanzania, Kenya, Gabon, Mozambique, Senegal, The Gambia and Malawi .Ttwo Communication Officers from the Ifakara Health Institute and the Kintampo Health Research Centre were part of the party.

The family gathered for one purpose- to serve as a throttle on malaria and fast track the malaria eradication goal.

Dr Mshinda said the media has a key role to play in pushing malaria out of Africa. He wondered whether the health workers are effectively communicating information on anti- malarials to their patients and whether the patients really understand what they communicate.

He said AMMREN is an important link between the community, patients and health workers as the media can bridge gaps where they exist. It is for this reason the INESS Project is happy to work with AMMREN to ensure the project succeeds.

Dr Mshinda said INESS will be used as a platform to generate information on drugs to see how they work in real life situation.

He also touched on the constant changes in malaria treatment policies right from chloroquine to the newly introduced artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs).

“We need to make a decision on the impact of drugs and usage,” he pointed out.

Dr. Mshinda advised AMMREN to organize itself well to access money “You need to incubate before you come out,” he said, urging AMMREN to build strong relationships with sites to increase its visibility.

AMMREN is collaborating with the INESS project to build the capacity of African journalists to report effectively on malaria and the INESS project. INESS is one of the innovative and unique initiatives which, has come in to support other interventions. It is focusing on anti malarials to ensure their safety and effectiveness in and outside the general health systems in Africa.

AMMREN is determined to work with INESS to create awareness on best practices in malaria treatment and drug usage. This is because the goals of INESS ties in with AMMREN's mission of partnering stakeholders towards the eradication of malaria.

A number of presentations were made during the three-day meeting on various topics such as what malaria is and what it is not, INESS and mapping malaria in Africa.

In one of the presentations, Dr Baraka Amuri of the Ifakara Health Institute stressed the molecular basis of the mosquito and its distinct preference for human blood and recognition of human-specific odours.

He said this knowledge should be of use in designing safe and effective repellents that reduce the transmission rate of malaria simply by reducing the efficiency with which mosquitoes find and feed on their human prey.

Dr Aziza Mwisongo, INESS Project Manager based in Tanzania, also touched on the overall goal of INESS, which is to provide national, regional and international health decision makers with independent and objective evidence on safety and effectiveness of new ACTs as a basis for malaria treatment policies.

Mrs. Charity Binka

Mrs Charity Binka, Executive Secretary of AMMREN said AMMREN is concerned with how to help the INESS project and change the landscape on malaria. She also briefly touched on the 2000 Abuja targets set by African Heads of States to cut down on malaria mortality and morbidity, increase the use of bed nets and other interventions, an agenda which appears to be far behind.

She said AMMREN is happy to collaborate with the INESS Project to take up the role of championing the eradication campaign and other interventions.

She said Communication Officers working with the sites are being brought on board AMMREN's agenda to bridge the gap between the research sites and the journalists to ensure that timely and accurate information is disseminated to the public.
The workshop also saw participants visiting a demographic surveillance site (DSS) and some INESS project sites in the Rufiji District. The visit covered the Bungu Dispensary facility, the Mchukwi Mission Hospital and the DSS Office of the Ifakara Health Institute at Rufiji, which is supporting the INEES project.

A communiqué was issued at the end of the workshop. The Communiqué noted the unmet targets set by African leaders in Abuja, Nigeria to tackle the malaria menace. Excerpts of the Communiqué are as follows:
“We observe that ten years on, these targets have not been met. However, with concerted efforts from all stakeholders - the Scientists, Journalists, Governments and Non-Governmental Organisations, malaria will become a disease of the past”.

“It is in view of this that we applaud efforts being made by INDEPTH Network, INESS and Malaria Clinical Trials Alliance (MCTA) for setting up various investigative sites in Africa to fight malaria. INESS is conducting a phase four study of Anti-malarials and this promises to bring hope to Africa”.