Regional cooperation is essential for accelerating sustainable development and finding long-term solutions to key development issues among African countries. Among these issues is malaria, which knows no boundaries. The cross-border movement of mosquitoes and people present a consistent challenge in its elimination. Therefore, it is essential that leaders work across country borders to:

• coordinate malaria interventions
• share data
• implement best practices and initiatives to eliminate malaria

Collaboration and working together to mainstream malaria

We are working with Regional Economic Communities to engage Heads of State and Government to address challenges and provide solutions to end malaria. We are achieving this through:

• developing regional scorecard tools for review by Heads of State and Government, and Ministers of Health and Finance
• sharing lessons learned and best practices amongst fellow countries
• establishing awards for excellence at the regional level

In collaboration with the RBM Partnership to End Malaria, with have signed memoranda of understanding (MoUs) with all of Africa’s Regional Economic Communities.

• East African Community (EAC)
• Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS)
• Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and West African Health Organization (WAHO)
• Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD)
• Southern African Development Community (SADC)

Progress so far

Our collective efforts to intensify joint cross-border action and regional cooperation have led to significant milestones including:

• the signing of the Windhoek Declaration on Eliminating Malaria in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region by Heads of State and Government and the subsequent approval of the Operationalisation Plan by Ministers of Health from respective states
• the development of five cross-border scorecard tools to track the performance of different regional malaria initiatives
• resource mobilisation support for Regional Economic Communities through the Global Fund helping three communities to bolster their human resources
• increased cross-border malaria initiatives such as the establishment of the Sahel Malaria Elimination Initiative in West Africa to coordinate resource mobilisation and the implementation of annual seasonal malaria chemoprevention (SMC), insecticide-treated nets and indoor residual spraying (IRS) campaigns across eight countries in the Sahel.