MARC-SE

The MARC SE-Africa project is designed to promote the translation of evidence of artemisinin and other drug resistance of public health significance to inform better malaria policy and practice before drug resistance increases the number of malaria cases and deaths. The consortium led by Karen Barnes will provide technical support to the 18 countries of Southern and East Africa, the area historically first affected by drug resistance. MARC SE-Africa is a 48-month project funded by the Global Health EDCTP3 Joint Undertaking established under the European Unions’ research and innovation programme, Horizon Europe.

MAGIC is leading Work Package 4: Implementation into Policy and Practice. This WP will begin through annual dialogues with evidence review groups, NMPs, and NMCP implementation partners on the most appropriate responses to any antimalarial evidence generated an expedited process will be initiated should new evidence of significant antimalarial resistance be identified.

Additional technical support will be provided to the two self-selected NMPs that formally commit to their need to update their malaria treatment malaria guidelines to respond to the threat of antimalarial resistance (at least at sub-national level). Their existing malaria guidelines will be migrated into the MAGICapp, and a systematic, transparent process followed using a GRADE approach to update these guidelines. The needs of Primary Health Care Worker will be identified and prioritized to inform development of additional MAGICapp functionalities and presentation formats. We anticipate the need to develop a mobile-friendly version of the MAGICapp that can be used both online and offline, given a high prevalence of cell phones in South-East Africa but with low bandwidth internet connectivity. Their impact will be evaluated in these two national, sub-national or cross border regions.