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World Malaria Day at PATH: “We’ve learned what works.”

By Anna Jensen-Clem

On April 25th  more than 40 people from a wide array of global health nonprofits gathered to celebrate World Malaria Day at PATH’s headquarters in South Lake Union. Most of the evening focused on networking and a Marketplace event, where PATH, Pilgrim Africa, RESULTS, Rotary Malaria Partners, Seattle BioMed, the UW Department of Global Health, the Washington Global Health Alliance, World Vision, Health Alliance International, the Worldwide Antimalarial Resistance Network, and Global Washington hosted informational tables and highlighted their latest malaria research.

Amie Batson, PATH’s new Chief Strategy Officer, convened a panel of four speakers to discuss challenges and breakthroughs in malaria research and to reflect on some of the upcoming issues in finding a cure. In her introductory remarks, Batson stated that we have seen a 50% decrease in malaria cases in many endemic countries over the past few years, because “we’ve learned what works and we’re having impact.” With new technological developments, we are even “better poised” to save children’s lives and eradicate the disease altogether.

The panel members each spoke briefly about their own research and discussed the importance of developing a preventative vaccine and ensuring that the parasite does not become (more) resistant to new forms of antimalarials. They also spoke to the need to keep donors and funders engaged even as they no longer see malaria as a daily, existential threat in many parts of the world.

David Brandling-Bennett, Malaria Program Deputy Director, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, outlined a three-point strategy for eliminating malaria, in line with earlier efforts to eradicate polio and measles. We need to start early in the hardest endemic areas; learn to “get the last mile right” using the right tools and approach; and gather information and data along the way—as the Carter Center has done for its nearly-successful guinea worm eradication effort.

Kent Campbell, Malaria Control Program Director, PATH, argued that defeating malaria “has no middle ground,” meaning that we can either eradicate it or allow it to flourish. Essentially, he said, “controlling malaria means getting rid of malaria.” At this point, one of the main challenges is to formulate strategies and funding programs for eradication.

Stefan Kappe, Malaria Program Director at Seattle BioMed, emphasized the need for the right tools and argued that eradication without an effective vaccine will be extremely difficult because we need to focus on blocking transmission from mosquito to human in addition to treating the symptoms once someone is infected.

Carol Sibley, Scientific Director, Worldwide Artemisinin Resistance Network, focused on finding the right tools to mitigate resistance. Although some level of resistance to antimalarials is inevitable, she said, the real question is “how do we slow it down?” We need sensible, usable data and a centralized database for analysis; this will aid in finding solutions and slowing the speed of resistance.

For more information about World Malaria Day and PATH’s work to eradicate the disease, please visit their blog, and for more information about last night’s event, you can follow the twitter hashtags #WorldMalariaDay and #MalariaExpoSea.

Dr. Is In! Developing your case and messaging: Stand out for what you stand for!

By Zahra Emrani

The third Global Washington’s 2013 capacity-building workshop was held on April 24 with a session on “Developing your case and messaging.” The lunchtime presentation was lead corporately by Sean Dimond director of External Relations at Pilgrim Africa and Joy Portella president of Minerva Strategies. Sean took participants through the general concepts and frame work of case and messaging and Joy presented case studies of her past works. At the end Sean took participants through taking a case and applying the conceptual theme that been discussed earlier to create a clear and powerful message.

Participants included representatives from the Days for Girls, Prosthetics Outreach Foundation and other GlobalWA members based in the greater Seattle area.

“Not only the presentations are wonderful, these workshops give us the opportunity to get to know and network with other communication coordinators in this sector.” said Jenna Swalin, Communications Coordinator at Initiative for Global Development. She added “Although participants are from diverse background and different starting points, presenters did a great job in addressing participants’ need!” Alison Dvaladze, Assistant Director for Outreach & Independent Consultant at Jackson school of international studies, University of Washington pointed out that “using the case studies and practical examples was super useful to understand the concept and learn how to implement it in practice!”

The “Dr. Is In” series on Fundraising will start on May. The first two sessions are “Building a Fundraising Plan & Case for Support” on May 10 and “Motivating Individual Donors: Building a Loyal Base of Donors” on May 14. Visit Global Washington’s website for the full list and to register for a session.

Global Social: Vietnam and Southeast Asia

Last week’s Global Social networking event focused the conversation on Vietnam and Southeast Asia; speakers from Peace Trees Vietnam and Partners Asia gave brief presentations on their work and opened the floor for questions

Michael Auch, Executive Director of Peace Trees Vietnam, discussed his organization’s goals and outlined five ongoing projects: mine risk education and de-mining; survivor assistance; citizen diplomacy trips, during which US citizens visit parts of Vietnam; building libraries and kindergartens; and microlending programs. Auch gave a brief overview of each project and highlighted PTV’s goal of integrating and leveraging the programs with each other to create a stronger presence in Vietnam that would provide a broader variety of services to the local populations.

Therese Caouette, Executive Director of Partners Asia, spoke about her ongoing work in Burma and focused particularly on Burma’s potential for growth in the coming years. In the last 18 months, Caouette said, Burma has experienced massive changes and newfound openness and this in turn allows her to speak more freely about Partners Asia’s work in the country. Partners Asia works mostly with populations in the rural border areas of Burma, as these groups are often desperately poor and vulnerable to exploitation and trafficking. The organization functions primarily as a small grant maker and instrument of community-led change.

Pwint Htun, a board member of Partners Asia and telecommunications consultant, spoke briefly about the trend toward openness and mobile communications in Burma; 95-95% of Burmese people, she said, lack access to financial services and about 95% have no access to communication services. The rapid increase in availability and ease of communication means that a new system must be designed in Burma “with the poorest people in mind,” as they stand to benefit the most from regulation and social change.

Before and after the presentations, Global Social attendees sampled Vietnamese sandwiches, sipped wine, and chatted with each other about their own work in Southeast Asia.

Our next Global Social will focus on Latin America, and will be on May 8^th at HUB Seattle, 4:30-6:30pm. Join us!