Nepal

MALARIA 11
Key Findings
Half of Nepal’s health facilities offer diagnosis and treatment for malaria.
About one-fifth of health facilities have at least one staff member recently
trained in malaria diagnosis and/or treatment.
Sixty percent of facilities that offer malaria diagnosis and/or treatment
services had first-line medicines (mainly chloroquine and primaquine) for
the treatment of malaria available on the day of the assessment visit.
Despite the policy of promoting free distribution of bed nets to antenatal
care clients, only 11 percent of health facilities that provide malaria
services had long-lasting insecticide-treated mosquito nets (LLINs) in
stock for distribution.
W
orldwide, malaria ranks fifth among causes of death from infectious diseases. In 2015, 95
countries and territories had ongoing malaria transmission and an estimated 3.2 billion people,
nearly half the world’s population, were at risk of malaria. WHO estimates that 438,000 deaths
occurred globally in 2015 (Malaria Fact Sheet, 2016, WHO)
This chapter explores the following key issues relating to provision of quality malaria prevention
and treatment services in Nepal:
Background. Section 11.1 provides a brief background on malaria.
Availability of services. Section 11.2, including Table 11.1, examines the availability of
malaria diagnosis and treatment services.
Service readiness. Section 11.3, including Tables 11.2, addresses the readiness of facilities to
provide good-quality malaria treatment and diagnosis, including the availability of trained staff,
guidelines, medicines, and laboratory diagnostic capacity.
Malaria service practices. Section 11.4, including Tables 11.3 through 11.5, reports on the
readiness of facilities offering care for sick children to diagnose and treat malaria and on the
frequency of diagnosis of malaria in sick children.
11.1 BACKGROUND
11.1.1 Health Situation Regarding Malaria in Nepal
Based on Nepal’s 2013 micro-stratification report ,(Department of Health Service Annual report
2014/2015), approximately 13 million people, or 48 percent of the country’s total population, live in village
development committees (VDCs) where malaria is endemic; almost a million people live in high-risk VDCs,
2.7 million live in moderate-risk VDCs, and 9.4 million live in low-risk VDCs. The high-risk areas consist
of foothills, river belts, forest fringe areas in the terai region, hill river valleys, and inner-terai areas, mostly
along the east-west highway.
Nepal’s National Malaria Strategic Plan (NMSP 2014-2025) has identified the following vision,
mission, goals, and objectives:
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