{"id":62724,"date":"2025-12-27T18:18:18","date_gmt":"2025-12-27T12:48:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=62724"},"modified":"2025-12-27T23:56:29","modified_gmt":"2025-12-27T18:26:29","slug":"invasive-mosquito-malaria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/27-12-2025\/invasive-mosquito-malaria","title":{"rendered":"Invasive Mosquito Species Threatens India\u2019s 2030 Malaria Elimination Goal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS2\/Health<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>As per the <strong>Malaria Elimination Technical Report, 2025<\/strong> urban malaria has emerged as a <strong>national concern <\/strong>threatening India\u2019s goal of eliminating the <strong>mosquito-borne disease by 2030.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Major Highlights<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Drivers of Transmission: <\/strong>Asymptomatic infections, difficult terrain, and population movement continue to drive transmission.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Cross-border transmission<\/strong> from Myanmar and Bangladesh also continues to affect border districts in northeastern India.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Besides the malaria elimination goal, India has also assigned itself an <strong>intermediate goal of achieving zero indigenous cases by 2027,<\/strong> aligning with the World Health Organisation\u2019s global strategy.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Invasive Threat: <\/strong>Anopheles stephensi is a significant mosquito species, now recognised as an invasive threat due to its ability to thrive in urban environments, breed in artificial containers (tanks, tires).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Reasons for Urban Transmission: <\/strong>Container breeding, construction sites, informal settings, high population density and fragmented healthcare delivery.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>High-burden pockets: <\/strong>India has now largely entered the pre-elimination phase, where malaria is no longer uniformly distributed across large geographical areas. <strong>High-burden pockets<\/strong> persist in districts of Odisha, Tripura and Mizoram.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Key challenges: <\/strong>Inconsistent private-sector reporting, limited entomological capacity, drug and insecticide resistance, operational gaps in remote tribal areas, and sporadic shortages of diagnostics and treatment commodities.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Recommendations:<\/strong> Strengthening surveillance systems, enhancing vector monitoring and improving supply chain reliability.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>What is Malaria?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Malaria <\/strong>is a life-threatening disease spread to humans by some types of mosquitoes and is mostly found in<strong> tropical countries.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Transmission: <\/strong>It is caused by <strong>plasmodium protozoa. <\/strong>The plasmodium parasites spread through the bites of <strong>infected female Anopheles mosquitoes<\/strong>. Blood transfusion and contaminated needles may also transmit malaria.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Types of parasites: <\/strong>There are 5 Plasmodium parasite species that cause malaria in humans and 2 of these species \u2013 <strong>P. falciparum and P. vivax <\/strong>\u2013 pose the greatest threat. The other malaria species which can infect humans are <strong>P. malariae, P. ovale and P. knowlesi.<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>P. falciparum is the deadliest malaria parasite<\/strong> and the most prevalent on the African continent P. vivax is the dominant malaria parasite in most countries outside of sub-Saharan Africa.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Symptoms:<\/strong> Fever and flu-like illness, including chills, headache, muscle ache and fatigue.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Vaccine:<\/strong> The RTS,S and R21 malaria vaccines act against P. falciparum, the deadliest malaria parasite globally and the most prevalent in Africa.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Both malaria vaccines are safe and efficacious, and both are prequalified by WHO.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Burden of Malaria (As per WHO)<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The malaria caseload in India was<strong> reduced by 69 percent<\/strong> from 6.4 million in 2017 to <strong>two million in 2023.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>In 2023,<strong> India accounted for half of all estimated malaria cases<\/strong> in the WHO South-East Asia Region, followed by Indonesia, which accounted for just under one-third.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Region had <strong>eight malaria endemic countries in 2023,<\/strong> accounting for<strong> 4 million cases <\/strong>and contributing <strong>1.5 per cent<\/strong> of the burden of malaria cases globally.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Bhutan and Timor-Leste, <\/strong>from the Region, reported <strong>zero malaria deaths<\/strong> since 2013 and 2015, respectively, while <strong>Sri Lanka<\/strong> was certified <strong>malaria-free in 2016.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Indian government Initiatives to Control Malaria:&nbsp;<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Government of India set a target to<strong> eliminate malaria in India by 2027.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>In India, a <strong>National Framework for Malaria Elimination (NFME)<\/strong> has been developed and launched in <strong>2016 <\/strong>aligned with the Global Technical Strategy (GTS) for malaria elimination <strong>2016-2030.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Malaria Elimination Research Alliance-India (MERA-India): <\/strong>It was established by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) as a conglomeration of partners working on malaria control.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/sci-tech\/health\/invasive-mosquito-species-that-thrives-in-cities-threatens-indias-2030-malaria-elimination-goal\/article70440000.ece#:~:text=Urban%20malaria%2C%20driven%20largely%20by,released%20Malaria%20Elimination%20Technical%20Report%2C\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>TH<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Context<\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">As per the Malaria Elimination Technical Report, 2025 urban malaria has emerged as a national concern threatening India\u2019s goal of eliminating the mosquito-borne disease by 2030.<\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><strong>Major Highlights<\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Drivers of Transmission: Asymptomatic infections, difficult terrain, and population movement continue to drive transmission.<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Cross-border transmission from Myanmar and Bangladesh also continues to affect border districts in northeastern India.<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Besides the malaria elimination goal, India has also assigned itself an intermediate goal of achieving zero indigenous cases by 2027, aligning with the World Health Organisation\u2019s global strategy.<\/li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/27-12-2025\/invasive-mosquito-malaria\" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read\u00a0More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62724","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62724"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62724\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62747,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62724\/revisions\/62747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}