IRS is not what I thought

I am swamped with data analysis from the research during the past few weeks, and I am in the midst of preparing for our upcoming week-long workshop (we'll be using the findings from the research to develop appropriate messages targeting the communities). BUT I wanted to share with you a few photos from the past few days (this may be it for a while, until I am un-swamped!):

First of all, due to limited staff availability I was tapped to attend the annual IRS launch in a nearby health district. (I admit that it was a little tough to be pulled away from my desk and workload...but this is for the team!) At first I thought, IRS? What? But here, IRS stands for Indoor Residual Spraying, and is part of the (US) President's Malaria Initiative (PMI) to reduce malaria incidence in countries where malaria is endemic. (Rwanda is one of those countries.) The Rwandan Ministry of Health also has a malaria-reduction program, so together the governments have aggressively been tackling the problem. IRS is one component of the approach used to reduce malaria incidence here; it's pretty self-explanatory, i.e., homes are sprayed with an insecticide, so mosquitoes carrying the malaria virus are killed when they land on walls that have been sprayed. The IRS program is one example of our US tax dollars at work, and it is exciting to report that since 2005, malaria prevalence here in Rwanda has been reduced by 40%! In addition, while only a year ago 40% of overall caseloads in the health centers were related to malaria, today only 15% of health center caseloads can be attributed to malaria. Yay!! This means fewer child deaths too, of course, as the majority of malaria deaths in Rwanda occur in children 10 and under.

Here are a couple of photos of the event yesterday, which included a big ceremony and then the inaugural house-spraying (pictured). While the chemical spray (a DDT derivative) is harmless to humans once it's been sprayed (and it's environmentally safe, for those of you who wondered), it's still toxic while being sprayed, so the sprayers are well-protected:



Here's the house that was sprayed:



Secondly....this is a random shot from last week, out in Nyamasheke. There was a huge vaccination campaign in Rwanda last week, in fact. You will be happy to note that twice a year the government has been sweeping the country, vaccinating every child, administering Vitamin A and Mebendazole (anti-worm medicine), and counseling families about family planning methods. Here are moms and children proudly displaying their vaccination cards:



Finally, the President of WR is here in town, staying at Phil and Becca's, and the other night some WR-Rwandan staff were over for dinner. Becca decided to serve Chinese food, for fun, and the staff learned how to use chopsticks. Some had never used them before, and they were very fast learners (they didn't want to eat with their hands!):



Talk to you again soon, I hope...I'll do my best to keep in touch here! Hope all's well back home....