PHNOM PENH, Jan. 4 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia recorded 4,042 cases of malaria in 2022, a decrease of 6 percent from 4,318 cases in 2021, a health official said on Wednesday.
"Of the reported cases, there had been no deaths," Huy Rekol, director of the National Center for Parasitology, Entomology and Malaria Control, told Xinhua.
Cambodia has recorded no malaria death since 2018, which made the Southeast Asian nation hailed as a successful country in eliminating malaria deaths three years earlier than its target, he said.
Rekol attributed the drop in malaria cases to people's better surveillance response, awareness, adequate equipment such as malaria testing devices, insecticide-treated mosquito nets, and anti-malarial drugs.
The official said malaria diagnostic tests and treatment are very effective and that Artesunate-Mefloquine, a medication used to treat malaria, which is also known as ASMQ, is 100 percent safe and efficacious against malaria.
"We hope that Cambodia will be able to eliminate malaria cases by 2025 because year after year, the number of malaria cases has dropped steadily," he said.
Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease, which is often found in rainy seasons and mostly happens in forest and mountainous provinces.
Rekol said to avoid being bitten by malaria-carrying mosquitoes, people living in malaria-prone areas should sleep under insecticide-treated mosquito nets all the time. ■
