National Malaria Strategic Plan (NMSP) of Zambia: 2022 – 2026

The Ministry of Health of the Republic of Zambia, in collaboration with partners, has developed the National Malaria Elimination Strategic Plan (NMESP) for 2022 to 2026. This document is in line with the WHO Global Technical Strategy (GTS) for Malaria 2016–2030 and the Southern Africa Malaria Elimination 8 (E8) Initiative.

The National Malaria Elimination Strategic Plan 2022-2026 (NMESP) builds on progress made and lessons learned in implementing the 2017-2021 NMESP. The process for developing the NMESP 2022-2026 emanates from the end term review (ETR) process which included thematic desk reviews, data analysis and field visits culminating into stakeholder consultation at national and subnational levels. The ETR was conducted in accordance with the WHO guidance on conducting malaria programme reviews (WHO, 2019). The low funding levels, procurement and supply chain challenges, COVID-19 pandemic and ongoing restructuring of the program led to low implementation rate of the planned NMSEP activities and MTR recommendations.

This resulted in inefficiencies in the delivery of malaria services across all service delivery areas, leading to reductions in epidemiological and entomological impact during 2017-2021. The ambition levels of the new strategy, 2022-2026, is to reduce malaria related morbidity and mortality nationally while pursuing subnational malaria elimination. Strategic directions will include lowering the burden in high-transmission settings, eliminating malaria in low-transmission settings and preventing the reintroduction of malaria transmission in malaria free HFCAs.

Goals:

1. Reduce malaria infection, disease and death in Zambia by 2026;
2. increase proportion of the population living in malaria free HFCAs and maintain malaria-free status and
3. prevent reintroduction and importation of malaria into areas where the disease has been eliminated.

Strategic objectives:

• Increase implementation rate of interventions from 72 percent in 2021 to 95 percent by 2026;
• Reduce malaria incidence from 340 cases per 1,000 population in 2021 to 201 cases per 1,000 population by 2026;
• Reduce malaria deaths from 8 deaths per 100,000 population in 2021 to 4.7 deaths per 100,000 population by 2026 and increase malaria free HFCAs from 10 in 2021 to 260 in 2026.