The Daily Trust newspaper in Abuja, Nigeria reported on Wednesday that over 110 million Nigerians have malaria. This shockingly high burden of disease is costing the country about $7 billion per year in treatment for the disease and the country is losing another $1 billion per year in lost productivity because employee absenteeism and subsidized malaria treatment.

You can read the story here:

About 90% of all malaria deaths globally occur in Africa, where a child dies of the disease every 30 seconds. More than 350 million people become severely ill each year. This is a preventable and treatable disease. Though the news from Nigeria is tragic, there is also good news in the progress against malaria. Kenya reduced childhood deaths by 44% in two years with a rapid expansion of malaria control programs. ACTs costing roughly $2 per dose could treat the men, women and children who fall victim to this disease and dramatically reduce the number of deaths from malaria.

The good news here makes it all the more tragic that so many people are dying primarily because they got bitten by a mosquito and don’t have access to even basic medical care. It is our hope that the next president of the United States will continue to ramp up our nation’s spending on malaria. If you are at a campaign event with a candidate, please ask them what he or she will do if elected president to stop malaria!

-Josh Lozman, ONE Vote ‘08 Policy Director