Rivercess County – Despite the distribution of mosquito nets, malarial remains the major reasons why people visit the Clinic, a Registered Midwife in River Cess County has alarmed.
Madam Hellen Kemue told Journalists recently that six or seven out of every ten cases seen at the Charlie Town Clinic in Rivercess County are malaria. The Officer-In-Charge (OIC) of the clinic noted that insecticide mosquito nets are given to every pregnant woman that visits the clinic as well as children under five years of age but malaria remains the most prevalent disease causing people to seek medical care at the clinic.
“This malaria thing really needs attention,” suggests OIC Kemue. “Because I can’t understand why people are still coming down with it when we are issuing nets to every pregnant woman, baby mothers, and children under five.”
Its barely a year since 17,816 households in Rivercess County were issued insecticide treated mosquitoes nets by the Christian Health Association of Liberia or CHAL. The distribution campaign was hailed for its progress, but recent upsurge in the malaria rate has reversed the gains health authority in the county made.
General Community Health Volunteers (gCHVs) working in the county complain that the nets are used for different purposes in communities instead of beneficiaries using it to prevent mosquitoes from biting them – the main cause of contracting malaria.
Genesis Wegelee, is a gCHV, he says people are using the nets for fishing baskets while others use the nets to build their chicken fence.
A mother identify as Grace who has just returned from the Gbediah Clinic told a Local Voices Liberia reporter that she does not sleep under nets due to the heat, saying: “I get (have) net but I can’t use it because of the heat.” Grace adds that her 10 years old daughter, Lisa, was recently diagnosed with malaria and she worried about her recovering soon.
According to the World Health Organization, malaria is a disease which infects the blood caused by a plasmodium parasite, which is transmitted from person to person by the female anopheles mosquito.
Once an infected mosquito bites a human and transmits the parasite, those parasites multiplied in the host’s liver before destroying the red blood cells. According to the US Center for Disease Control, the disease can be controlled and treated if diagnosed earlier.
The Health promotion focus person (HPFP) of the River Cess County Health Team, Yorgie Flomo, says one way to prevent malaria is to keep the surrounding clean.
The HPFP warn people to make use of the treated mosquito nets issued by the various health workers in the county.
Report by: Eric Opa Doue, Rivercess Cunty
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