More than 1 in 5 child deaths in low income countries are due to pneumonia. This death rate could be reduced if all affected children received effective pneumonia treatment (known as "standard case management"), which includes antibiotics and oxygen therapy. The government of Malawi recently introduced a national program for delivering standard case management for pneumonia to children. In this week's PLoS Medicine, Penelope Marjorie Enarson (International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease, Child Health Lung Division, Paris, France) and colleagues in Malawi and South Africa describe the development, scale-up, and achievements of this program, which is modeled on a similar program to tackle TB.
Funding: Funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant ID#: 413 ( http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx ). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
Citation: Enarson PM, Gie R, Enarson DA, Mwansambo C (2009) Development and Implementation of a National Programme for the Management of Severe and Very Severe Pneumonia in Children in Malawi. PLoS Med 6(11): e1000137.doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1000137
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CONTACT:
Penelope Enarson
International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease
Child Lung Health
68 Boulevard St Michel
Paris, 75006 France
+33 1 56 80 28 25
penarson@theunion.org
PLOS Medicine