The SMC Alliance celebrates 10 years of SMC

Guinea is hosting the 5th annual meeting of the CPS Alliance this week. An opportunity taken by the leaders of the SMC Alliance (seasonal malaria chemoprevention) leaders to celebrate the 10th anniversary of its creation. The ceremony took place in Conakry, Guinea.

Present at the ceremony, Ms. Amy Diallo of USAID, Director of the USAID Office of Health, spoke about the purpose of this ceremony and the mission of SMC. "We are here tonight to celebrate 10 years of seasonal malaria chemoprevention. This is an approach in which you give antimalarial medicines to young children during the months of the rainy season to prevent malaria. It is an approach that is very effective. Here in Guinea we are working with the National Malaria Control Program and we have very good results and with the support of the U.S. President's Malaria Initiative, we have succeeded with other partners and the government to reduce malaria. In fact, we have saved lives, a total of 12 million people since 2013." 

For her part, the head of the National Malaria Elimination Program in Nigeria, Nnenna Ogbulafor, in her communication expressed her joy in being in Guinea, while adding that this ceremony is a major turning point since the implementation of the program for 10 years. "As you know, Nigeria is the big brother of Africa in terms of population and since 2013, we have been very active in the fight against malaria (which mainly affects children and pregnant women). With the 17 countries present during these 3 days, we hope to establish a strong partnership to fight against malaria.

Finally, the representative of the Republic of Mali thanked the medicines' manufacturers because since 2016 there is a great evolution and Mali started in 2017 with the door to door approach. He also pointed out that despite this great approach to the fight against malaria, there are cases of adverse reactions of products in some people, even if to date the percentage remains low.

This celebration was followed by the closing ceremony where participants were pleased with the progress of the meeting in Conakry.