A groundbreaking study conducted in Uganda has found that treating traditional cloth wraps, known as lesus, with a common insecticide can dramatically decrease malaria rates in infants. Researchers discovered that babies carried in permethrin-treated lesus were two-thirds less likely to develop the deadly disease compared to those in untreated wraps.
The trial, which involved 400 mothers and their 6-month-old infants in the rural, mountainous Kasese region, is a promising development in the global fight against malaria. Malaria claims over 600,000 lives annually, the vast majority of them African children under the age of five.
“I’ve had five children. This is the first one that I’ve carried in a treated wrap, and it’s the first time I’ve had a child who has not had malaria,” remarked one mother who participated in the study.
Co-lead investigator Dr. Edgar Mugema Mulogo, a professor of public health at Mbarara University of Science and Technology, said the results were “tremendously exciting.” His counterpart, Dr. Ross Boyce from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, was initially sceptical but was “astounded” by the magnitude of the findings.
The researchers noted that while mosquitoes that transmit malaria have traditionally bitten at night, they are increasingly feeding during the day, potentially adapting to the widespread use of bed nets. Treated lesus could provide a crucial additional layer of protection for infants during the evening and early morning hours when they are most vulnerable.
“Before you go to bed, when you’re outdoors – particularly in the rural community, where the kitchens are outside, probably they have the evening meal outside – we also need to find a solution ensuring that we can prevent those bites likely to transmit malaria,” explained Mulogo.
The insecticide used, permethrin, has a strong safety record and has been applied to textiles by the US military for years. While the study did find a slightly higher incidence of rashes in the treated group, the researchers say the benefits far outweigh the risks.
Mulogo is hopeful that this simple, cost-effective intervention could one day be produced locally, creating business opportunities in Uganda. Health officials in the country, as well as global malaria experts at the World Health Organization, have expressed keen interest in the research.
As the next steps, the team plans to explore whether treating school uniforms can also help reduce malaria rates. However, Boyce noted that funding for the subsequent research stages is not yet secured. Nevertheless, he is optimistic that the straightforward nature of the approach will appeal to potential donors.
“My mother can understand what we did. It’s not some specific inhibitor of a fusion protein or something like that. We took some cloth and we soaked it. And it’s dirt cheap,” said Boyce.