Background
Funding from external agencies for malaria control in Africa has increased dramatically over
the past decade resulting in substantial increases in population coverage by effective malaria
prevention interventions. This unprecedented effort to scale-up malaria interventions is likely
improving child survival and will likely contribute to meeting Millennium Development Goal
(MDG) 4 to reduce the <5 mortality rate by two thirds between 1990 and 2015.

Methods
The Lives Saved Tool (LiST) model was used to quantify the likely impact that malaria
prevention intervention scale-up has had on malaria mortality over the past decade (2001–
2010) across 43 malaria endemic countries in sub-Saharan African. The likely impact of ITNs
and malaria prevention interventions in pregnancy (intermittent preventive treatment [IPTp]
and ITNs used during pregnancy) over this period was assessed.

Results
The LiST model conservatively estimates that malaria prevention intervention scale-up over
the past decade has prevented 842,800 (uncertainty: 562,800–1,364,645) child deaths due to
malaria across 43 malaria-endemic countries in Africa, compared to a baseline of the year
2000. Over the entire decade, this represents an 8.2% decrease in the number of malariacaused child deaths that would have occurred over this period had malaria prevention
coverage remained unchanged since 2000. The biggest impact occurred in 2010 with a 24.4%
decrease in malaria-caused child deaths compared to what would have happened had malaria
prevention interventions not been scaled-up beyond 2000 coverage levels. ITNs accounted
for 99% of the lives saved.

Conclusions
The results suggest that funding for malaria prevention in Africa over the past decade has had
a substantial impact on decreasing child deaths due to malaria. Rapidly achieving and then
maintaining universal coverage of these interventions should be an urgent priority for malaria
control programmes in the future. Successful scale-up in many African countries will likely
contribute substantially to meeting MDG 4, as well as succeed in meeting MDG 6 (Target 1)
to halt and reverse malaria incidence by 2015.