RAVREDA-AMI: Amazon Network for the Surveillance of Antimalarial Drug Resistance (RAVREDA) / Amazon Malaria Initiative (AMI)

RAVREDA/AMI Thematic Area:

Vector Control

Improving the Impact of Vector Control Efforts via Evidence-Based Vector Control

In 2004 and 2005, technical cooperation promoted by RAVREDA helped introduce a cooperation agenda in the Amazon aimed at improving the approach to malaria vector control in the Amazon subregion. In accordance with Roll Back Malaria guidelines, the project is promoting a strategy to guide vector-control interventions and rational use of insecticides. It is based on systematically adopting a methodology of stratification, targeting interventions in critical areas, using available epidemiological information to select and evaluate interventions, and forming a 'local study network' for where countries can systematically evaluate interventions using standardized entomological indicators.

• Evidence-Based Selective Vector Control
• Strategy to Guide Decision-Making in Control of Malaria Vectors in the Countries of the Amazon Region (draft, in Spanish)
• Annex 7: Operational and Epidemiological Indicators for Evaluating Vector-Control Measures for Malaria (draft, in Spanish)
• Annex 11: Procedures and Indicators for Decision-Making in Malaria Vector Control in Selected Localities (draft, in Spanish)
• Meeting on the Proper Use of Entomology in Malaria Control Programs in the Americas (Panama City, Panama, 1–4 August 2006) (draft, in Spanish)

The information thereby generated in routine services will make it possible to guide interventions at the local level and, at the same time, create an information system on entomological and operational indicators that will help the different levels in their decision-making:

• Guidelines for Implementation of a Quality-Management System in Microscopic Diagnosis of Malaria: Standardization of Procedures and Tools for Quality Control and External Performance Evaluation in Laboratory Networks (Proposal of a Technical Group, Caracas, Venezuela, July 2004, draft)

Monitoring temporal and spatial variations in anopheline resistance to insecticides is identified among the variables that this system will include. In this area, with CDC support, concrete progress was made in 2005 in standardizing methodologies to monitor resistance.