Malaria in school-age children: opportunities to improve health, learning, and reduce transmission
In June 2022, WHO published the consolidated guidelines for malaria; a package of new and updated recommendations across a number of technical areas – from malaria chemoprevention and mass drug administration to elimination. The guidelines encourage countries to tailor the recommendations to local disease settings for maximum impact.
LSHTM scientists have worked for decades on novel approaches to prevent malaria. A major focus has been chemoprevention – the use of malaria drugs to prevent infection and disease. Chemoprevention strategies work on the basis that a malaria treatment will clear any existing infections and prevent new infections for a period of time. Since the 1980s, researchers from the Malaria Centre have been investigating the use of medicines to prevent malaria among children living in the Sahel, where transmission is highly seasonal. This line of inquiry continues and led to Seasonal Malaria Chemoprevention (SMC) originally being recommended by WHO 10 years ago.
Since the 1990s LSHTM staff have also worked on intermittent preventive treatment (IPT) of malaria in pregnancy (IPTp), recommended by WHO in 1998, and in infants (IPTi), recommended by WHO in 2010. All three recommendations were updated in June, drawing on evidence generated in part by LSHTM and its collaborators.
We are delighted to be hosting Dr Lauren Coehee, the first in a series of three this Autumn, as we discuss the latest recommendations and the implications on malaria prevention.
Dr Lauren Cohee is a pediatric infectious disease specialist, with primary research interests in malaria and global child health. She began conducting malaria research as an Emerging Infectious Disease Laboratory in the Malaria Branch at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2000. She is currently an Assistant Professor at University of Maryland School of Medicine Centre for Vaccine Development and Global Health where she has conducted epidemiologic studies of malaria in Malawi since 2011. She is supported by a NIH K23 Career Development Award and a Doris Duke Clinician Scientist Development Award.
Dr Cohee received her medical degree from The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine ('08). She completed residency training in pediatrics and was a chief resident in the Harriet Lane Pediatric Residency Program at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center.
Dr Cohee completed fellowship training in Infectious Diseases and Tropical Pediatrics as well as a Master's degree in Clinical Research with a focus on Epidemiology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Her current research focuses on identifying reservoirs of malaria transmission and defining and addressing the burden of malaria in school-age children.
Please note that you can join this event in person or you can join the session remotely.