Victor Alegana: Estimating disease burden in Africa
Channel: Tropical Medicine Oxford
Date: 2020-09-04

Dr Victor Alegana from our KEMRI Wellcome Trust Research Programme in Nairobi, Kenya, tells us about his work to increase the use of routine data to estimate disease burden of infectious diseases in Africa. 

Health statistics help us quantify the burden of disease in a population, and the impact of interventions. In sub-Saharan Africa, only half of febrile malaria cases are treated in the formal health sector; what is happening in the private sector or informally is not well understood. With improved diagnostics and treatments, testing and treating has become better, but tracking involves more routine systems to improve surveillance.