New malaria map provides insight into disease development

Efforts to analyse the development of malaria over time have been bolstered by the creation of a new suite of maps charting the disease's global patterns.

A team from the Wellcome Trust-funded Malaria Atlas Project (MAP) have assembled all available data on the risk of Plasmodium falciparum malaria over two years, before using computer modelling and climate and population data to create the maps.

The freely-available maps provide details of where the disease is at its most intense and which populations are most at risk of contracting it, as well as the sharp variations in the spread of malaria even over short distances.

It will help authorities to allocated funding to where it is most needed and ensure that public health initiatives are targeted correctly.

Dr Simon Hay, who leads the MAP group at the University of Oxford, said: "It's increasingly clear that malaria transmission is extremely heterogeneous. This means a one-size-fits all approach to controlling is not appropriate. What works in one place might not work elsewhere."

According to the World Health Organization, malaria causes a million deaths each year and threatens around half of the world's population.