Eradicating malaria focal theme of World Malaria Day 2010

Advertising display with 10 thousand living malaria mosquitoes in Amsterdam

On 25 April, an advertising display will be filled with ten thousand living malaria mosquitoes and placed on Koningsplein in Amsterdam for World Malaria Day. One million children die of malaria every year. Arjan Erkel of Malaria No More! hopes that filling the display with mosquitoes will raise the public's awareness of malaria.

Ten thousand living malaria mosquitoes will fly around in an advertising display like the ones that are often placed next to bus shelters. The purpose of the display is to attract attention to World Malaria Day. Malaria No More! director Arjan Erkel will unveil the display on 25 April at 2 p.m. Malaria No More! came up with the idea of using mosquitoes as a way of drawing attention to the disease.

'Malaria is easy to prevent and can even be successfully treated', explains Arjan Erkel. 'But a lot more money is available for AIDS than for malaria. If we work together, we can get the disease under control by 2015. It costs as little as €3.50 to protect a child in a developing country from malaria.'

Malaria is the disease of the poor. Every year, malaria takes 3 million lives. Every 30 seconds, a child dies of malaria. Malaria is the main cause of death in Africa, and costs the continent €12 billion a year in health care and lost productivity. The focal theme of World Malaria Day 2010 is eradicating the disease.

The ten thousand malaria mosquitoes are from Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre.