The intermittent preventive treatment against malaria in pregnancy (IPTp) is a highly cost-effective intervention with the potential to save many maternal and neonatal lives. However, IPTp coverage remains low in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) where immediate action is needed for dramatic scale up. While some obstacles to IPTp uptake relate to large health-systems issues, many barriers are common across countries and could be overcome with relative ease and speed. This is a pivotal moment for the scale up of IPTp. To maximize its public health impact, we must prioritize IPTp by acting to:
- Incorporate the World Health Organization’s (WHO) 2012policy update for IPTp1 into national guidelines and practices ;
- Rally efforts that will narrow achievement gaps in Millennium Development Goals No. 4 and No. 5 before the end of 2015 ;
- Prepare for Sustainable Development Goal No. 6 as it becomes the focal point of health sector action.
From the Roll Back Malaria (RBM) Partnership and its malaria in pregnancy (MIP) Working Group, we urge you to take immediate action as outlined below to protect pregnant women and their babies from malaria, drawing on your institutional mandates and comparative advantages. The RBM Partnership, through its core partners that work in malaria-endemic countries, will support governments of SSA to implement this Call to Action and will disseminate best practices and lessons learned to accelerate IPTp scale up.