At a Global Fund Country Team meeting in Lilongwe, ActionAid Malawi urged development partners to invest in community-led health programmes rather than top-down policies. Nyasa Times reports that the organisation is expanding its Community-Led Monitoring initiative across multiple districts to improve accountability and address service delivery gaps exposed during the COVID-19 pandemic. ActionAid representatives stated that universal health coverage in Malawi requires giving affected communities the power to direct solutions to their own medical problems.
Update: Following earlier coverage of regional malaria vaccine studies, new data from the rollout in Malawi, Kenya, and Ghana shows a decline in severe malaria cases and hospital admissions among young children. However, funding shortages threaten to slow this progress. According to Top Africa News, the regional malaria vaccination programme currently faces a nearly 30 percent budget deficit. Gavi and international health officials are calling for increased financial support to maintain the programme and reach their target of vaccinating 50 million children across Africa by 2030.