From the RNA, it also clearly emerged that there is still a lot of misconceptions and myths associated with malaria. With the majority of those surveyed believing that malaria is spread by eating some kinds of food i.e. sugarcane; unripe mangoes, by walking in the rain or by walking in the sunlight.

Children also tend to receive late treatment after malaria symptoms have onset with one of the primary reasons being the cultural practices that requires a sick woman or child can only go to the hospital after seeking permission from the husband. Other reasons include long distances to travel to the nearest hospital and extreme poverty that reduces these households ability to meet medical costs

The six thousand nets are now in Nairobi and will soon be in Mbita, hopefully by next week. The plan is to distribute the nets in 10 different areas over the course of the month of June 2007. Both photos, video will be taken and posted on the website, along with a one page summary of the distribution.

Magdalene Ouma, the Chief Administrator of the Akado Clinic has stated, “This donation of six thousand malaria bed nets will go into local history book as the largest consignment of insecticide treated nets ever distributed to the poorest and most marginalized households in the Mbita region by either a non-governmental organization or a CBO. We also wanted to draw your kind attention that the nets provided by Kenyan government have failed to reach the poorest pregnant women and desperate children less than 5 years old, since the majority cannot meet the costs and conditions imposed by the government.”

Next week the shipment of 6,000 long lasting insecticide treated mosquito nets will be on their way to Kenya. These nets have been generously provided to us by the Swim Against Malaria Foundation. Although the nets are being provided to us at no cost for the nets themselves the project of distributing them will incur additional cost of transporting them from Bangkok to Mombasa Kenya, then the cost of shipping them from Mombasa to Mbita and finally the costs of distributing the nets to the designated women and children in the surrounding areas of Mbita. We estimated these costs to be approximately $4000 dollars or about 65 cents a nets. So for each 65 cents we raise a child in Mbita will be provided with a life saving net. So far we have raised $2023 dollars and by the beginning of May 2007 we need to raise the additional money.

The entire distribution will be in the Suba District region of Kenya. The distribution area consists of slums,fishing villages and townships located in Mbita, Rusinga Island and Gembe. These three areas are adjacent to one another and located near Lake Victoria. Mbita is approximately 400 km from Nairobi.

A 2005 health survey in the Mbita region of Kenya concluded that malaria was the leading cause of death of children in the region and that children between six months and five years old were at the greatest risk for contracting the disease. The survey concluded that providing mosquito nets would have a significant impact on reducing the spread of malaria in the region and on the overall health of the children in the community.

Please help us by donating generously. We will update the site with pictures and the names of the recipients so you can actually see that your money has provided a life saving measure to a Kenyan child.

Click here to Donate

Against Malaria is an initiative of the World Swim For Malaria Foundation (WSMF), a charity registered in the UK, US, Australia and a number of other countries. WSMF launched and ran World Swim Against Malaria (WSM) on 3rd Dec 2005 in which more than 250,000 people swam and fundraised. 100% of the US$1.3m raised purchased 270,000 long lasting insecticidal nets (LLINs) which are now being distributed to protect 540,000 (mainly) children from biting insects when they sleep at night. Through WSFM amazing success at raising funds they have been able to negotiate an incredibly low price of $5.00 a net for nets that will last for 4 to 5 years. As a partner with Against Malaria we too will able to purchase nets for $5.00 each.

In practice, 100% of the funds we receive through Against Malaria will be used to buy long lasting insecticidal (mosquito) nets (LLINs). Further we state they will end up over heads and beds and we will demonstrate that has happened. Transparency is at the heart of what we do.

To view the distribution areas and take a look at the distribution plan you can go to the following links at Swim Against Malaria.

Mbita Township
Gembe
Rusinga Island

We are currently raising $4000 in funds to pay for the transportation and delivery of these nets to the children and women who need them. If you would like to donate please go here: http://www.projectmosquitonet.org/donate.

We are still raising funds for the 2007 net distribution so please consider donating today to this worthy cause.

The Health Education Day and mosquito net distribution took place in Mbita, Kenya on Friday 11th August 2006. The day was a great success, and was organized by the Akado Medical Center and attended by the largest number of orphaned and vulnerable children ever hosted before due to our expansion to 15 more schools.

We held meetings in three different zones to allow even more of the orphaned and vulnerable children to attend the event.

Introductions

The Clinical Officer did the introduction of the day as Health Education Day on Malaria. He gave the orphaned pupils a chance to introduce themselves. He also gave a short explanation on the transmission of malaria by mosquitoes. He explained the reasons that the mosquito bites humans and stores their blood is because it strengthens the mosquito’s reproduction ability. He stated that when a mosquito bites a person and then the person contracts malaria it then progresses to the next person when the mosquito bites the next person thus transmitting from one person to the next person.

Health Topics Discussed

This years Health Education Day was framed as a critical intervention and the following information was provided to the pupils and their providers:

• The importance of early diagnosis and prompt treatment of malaria.
• The importance of correct dosage and ensuring that it is completed a second dose of SP should not be taken for at least 3 weeks.
• Importance of antipyretic and fluid treatment should be emphasized
• SP apparently has slow action on the clinical symptoms
• Fever episode may recur within 48 hours after the dose of SP; therefore, there is also the need for antipyretics to manage the fever episode.
• The children’s care providers were given clear information and the facilitator confirmed if it was understood.

This years meeting was presided over by the Public Health Officer, government officials, Professor Achola Pala and visitors from child-focused organizations. Orphans and vulnerable children attended it from 20 primary schools in the area.

The event was the most successful event ever held recently.

A Speech From Professor Pala

After health education, Professor Achola, the only woman professor in the community and the wife of the former Ambassador to the United States, gave a speech. She related her life history. She spoke about her difficulties during her schooling and the fact that she was the seventh born in a family of nine and most of her elder sisters had dropped out of school due to early marriages. In addition, villagers also discouraged her parents from educating girls. At class two, she dropped out of school and went to stay with her older sister who was a teacher at a local school in the area. She took care of her niece for three months during her stay with her sister. During this time, her sister would give her homework. After this time, she went back to school. She finished her primary education, did very well in national exams, and because of her high scores received a sponsorship for high school. She later proceeded to one of the best universities in United States where through sponsorship she completed her Ph.D. She highly encouraged the girls to concentrate on their studies.

Speech From One of the Children’s Representative

One of the orphaned girls from Kombe primary school encouraged her peers to concentrate in school and forget about leisure. She said that many orphaned girls in the villages are lured by small gifts and money, making them fall prey to exploitative-men and resulting in early pregnancies, which cause girls to drop out of high school. She also spoke about rural poverty and talked about how it is a result of HIV / AIDS.

She said that many girls resort to prostitution to get money in order to survive. She encouraged her fellow girls to concentrate in their studies to avoid ending up in these circumstances. She finally appealed to those in authority to ensure protection, promotion and enhancement of child rights as a solution to their problems.

Speech From The Public Health Officer

The Public Health officer in charge of Suba District, who is also the coordinator and the representative of Constituency Aids Control Committee (CACC) was introduced. He talked about Akado Women’s Group as a part of the Akado Medical Center, role as an active group in the area. As a representative of the Kenyan government, the government recognizes the good work done by both the Akado Medical Center and its partners.

He also confirmed that his office would continue supporting this noble cause to humankind.

Distribution Of The Nets

We distributed one hundred and twenty nets to the invited children. A mosquito net was issued to each child, while the Nyatiti music group entertained the participants with songs and instrumentals highlighting the importance of orphaned and vulnerable children’s education, protection from malaria, HIV/AIDS prevention, good parenting skills and child rights issues.

The whole group broke for a delicious lunch prepared by Akado Staff.

The net fundraising and purchasing were conducted by Stacey Blaschke and Alka Subramanian. Project Mosquito Net is a grass based project and collaboration between Power of Love and Be the Cause.

I’ve never asked for anything before, right? Well, sorry, I’m asking now. We need nets. Not hoop nets, soccer nets or lacrosse nets. Not New Jersey Nets or dot-nets or clarinets. Mosquito nets.See, nearly 3,000 kids die every day in Africa from malaria. And according to the World Health Organization, transmission of the disease would be reduced by 60% with the use of mosquito nets and prompt treatment for the infected.Three thousand kids! That’s a 9/11 every day!

…We gotta get these nets. They’re coated with an insecticide and cost between $4 and $6. You need about $10, all told, to get them shipped and installed. Some nets can cover a family of four. And they last four years. …10 bucks means a kid might get to live….I tried to think how many times I have said or written the word “net” in 28 years of sports writing, and I came up with, conservatively, 20,000. So I’ve already started us off with a $20,000 donation. … Together, we could come up with $1 million, net. How many lives would that save? More than 50 times the population of Nett Lake, Minn.

…I know what you’re thinking: Yeah, but bottom line, how much of our $1 million goes to nets? All of it. Thanks to Ted Turner, who donated $1 billion to create the U.N. Foundation, which covers all the overhead, “every cent will go to nets,” says Andrea Gay, the U.N. Foundation’s Director of Children’s Health.One last vignette: A few years back, we took the family to Tanzania, which is ravaged by malaria now. We visited a school and played soccer with the kids…A taped-up wad of newspapers was the ball and two rocks were the goal. Most fun I ever had getting whupped. When we got home, we sent some balls and nets.I kick myself now for that. How many of those kids are dead because we sent the wrong nets?

The event was generously cosponsored by several campus organizations, Global Connect @ UCI, the Social Sciences Dean’s Ambassador Council and ASUCI and Project Mosquito Net.

The concept of the day was to both raise awareness and funds regarding malaria and the potential life saving effects of providing mosquito bed nets to children in malaria epidemic regions in Africa. The event began around 11 am with the Social Science professors taking a shot in a faculty shoot off. The baseball cap clad, Associate Dean of Social Sciences, Caesar D. Sereseres, participated, taking a few practice shots and then competitively took a few dunks while a KUCI DJ played music in the plaza. A lunchtime spirit pep rally drew in a large crowd of several hundred including the UCI Baseball team, who all volunteered to dunk and were joined by the Laker Girls who volunteered their time to help out this worthy cause. On display was a mosquito bed nets provided to the children Mbita. In the middle of the plaza was placed an outdoor, portable hoop for all who wanted to take a shot. The idea for the day was to have a collective of individuals taking a shot, donating a dollar or two and effectively “dunking malaria” with their actions while at the same raising awareness about this life threatening and devastating disease. All funds collected from the day went to Project Mosquito Net to purchase nets for the 2006 Health Education Day and Mosquito Bed Net distribution. Following the day it was determined by Lance Laifer, the founder of Dunk Malaria that UCI was the international winner of the Dunk Malaria contest.