Philip Welkhoff
Director, Malaria, Gates Foundation
Malaria still kills over 600,000 people every year,1 even though it’s preventable and treatable. Children under five in Africa carry the heaviest burden — school lessons missed, futures cut short.
In too many communities, health systems are stretched beyond their limits, trying to protect mothers and babies from a disease we can consign to history.
Pivotal moment for malaria efforts
After two decades of hard-won progress, momentum has stalled. Drug and insecticide resistance is spreading as parasites and mosquitoes evolve to outsmart our most proven tools. Climate shocks and conflict are compounding risk.
Global health budgets are under immense strain. When malaria efforts lose ground, resurgence is fast and brutal. This is the moment for what has been termed the “Big Push”: a coordinated commitment to sustain financing, accelerate transformational tools and deliver them at the scale needed to outpace the disease.
Science is advancing faster than ever, and our
political and financial will must match its pace.
Tools to end malaria are near at hand
Two vaccines are already reaching children and saving lives, with next-generation vaccines following. We’re on track for a single-dose cure for the deadliest type of malaria. And new genetically based tools are being studied, showing promise of stopping transmission altogether. Science is advancing faster than ever, and our political and financial will must match its pace.
Britain’s role here is central, from Sir Ronald Ross discovering in 1897 that mosquitoes transmit malaria to the R21 vaccine today. For two decades, the UK has been the second-highest funder of malaria R&D globally,2 and British institutions are advancing many of the most promising tools currently in development. That investment has helped save more than 14 million lives since 20001 — and more than half of that R&D2 spend flows directly back into UK institutions, driving skilled jobs and scientific leadership.
I’m more optimistic than I’ve ever been that we can eradicate malaria within a generation. But that future isn’t inevitable. Sustained innovation and investment from countries like the UK, alongside increased domestic financing, is how we secure a malaria-free world, save the lives of mothers and children, alleviate pressures on health systems and accelerate economic growth.
[1] WHO. (2025). World malaria report 2025. https://tinyurl.com/mu7h7z4t.
[2] Impact Global Health. From discovery to approval: mapping the global health R&D pipeline. https://tinyurl.com/23sd2tsp.
