Oriental Mindoro is now a malaria-free province, the Department of Health (DOH) announced on Thursday.
“We wish to congratulate all of you for this milestone, but our work does not end here, as the gains achieved by the province must be maintained to prevent re-establishment of transmission through several strategies,” DOH officer-in-charge Maria Rosario Vergeire said in a statement.
The DOH said Oriental Mindoro has completed the requirements stated in Department Circular No. 2021-0249, which provides for the guidelines for declaring certain areas as malaria-free.
The declaration on Oriental Mindoro was also recommended by the National Malaria Elimination and Control Technical Working Group, it added.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), malaria is a life-threatening disease caused by parasites that are transmitted to people through the bites of infected female Anopheles mosquitoes.
In 2021, there were an estimated 247 million cases of malaria worldwide, the WHO revealed. The report also showed there were around 619,000 malaria-related deaths during the same year.