Senegal: Youssou Ndour backs Senegal's war on malaria

Senegal continues with it’s campaign towards eradication of Malaria. The country received some 32 million USD from the Lives and Livelihood Development Fund, to completely eradicate the disease by 2030.

Malaria has drastically declined in the country by more that 50% between 2009 and 2015 according to the country’s Ministry of Health.

Senegalese singer and activist Youssou Ndour is also engaged in the campaign to combat the illness that is still considered a public health problem.

The disease remains all too common in Senegal, despite a government pledge to eradicate it by 2018, with 500,000 recorded Senegalese cases in 2015, according to the WHO.

“It’s first of all a serious public health problem. But we also see the economic impact around it and the weaknesses we have at the level of development in Africa because of malaria,” Ndour told AFP in an interview in Senegal’s capital Dakar.

The Lives and Livelihoods Fund, which targets health projects in Muslim-majority nations and is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and several Gulf states, is backing the project with the Senegalese government.

The program will provide insecticide-treated mosquito nets to 2.5 million people and more than 70,000 doses of antimalarials, and train 400 community workers.