The warning was made here during the donation of 120 mosquito nets by Gaborone Rotary Club (GRC) to the Ngamiland District Health Team to prevent the rising malaria prevalence in the district. The nets will be distributed to people living in the Okavango Delta. There are 96,000 people living in Ngamiland. It was explained that given the high transmission brought by its watery terrain, proper usage of mosquito nets is a must in order to achieve the "no transmission" status.
Malaria is transmitted though bites from the infected anopheles mosquitoes.Speaking during the handover ceremony on Saturday, head of health services in Ngamiland, Dr Christopher Chembe noted that the district experienced an upsurge in the number of reported Malaria cases in 2013. The cases increased from 15 reported in 2012 to 68 during this year's malaria season. There has been one death recorded, the first casualty recorded since 2012.Chembe revealed that the highest number of deaths recorded was in 2001 when 16 people died but since then there had been an improvement in the mortality rate. The district of Ngamiland, a tourist attraction is a Malaria red zone.
