Support for malaria research
![An Anopheles Mosquito on human skin [Photo: Shutterstock]](/media/Media_769279_smxx.jpg)
We’ve been awarded almost £3m to continue our pioneering mosquito research.
Two separate grants amounting to £2.9m have been awarded to Professor Steven Sinkins, Professor at the MRC-University of Glasgow Centre for Virus Research (CVR). The funding will enable Professor Sinkins and his team to conduct potentially life-saving research into the naturally occurring malaria transmission-blocking microbe, Microsporidia MB, discovered recently in wild populations of Anopheles mosquitoes in Kenya.
It will also, via the ANTI-VeC Network, support research groups in sub-Saharan Africa to carry out surveys on this microsporidian, giving a much better picture of its distribution.
Malaria kills around 400,000 people each year and imposes a huge burden on Africa. The World Health Organisation (WHO) recently stressed the need to continue the efforts against malaria, despite the necessary focus on COVID-19, and said deaths from malaria could rise significantly across sub-Saharan Africa if work to prevent the disease is disrupted by the coronavirus outbreak.