RED Distribution released the Indie Rocks! benefit album today, with 100% of the proceeds going to Malaria No More. The digital-download album is available exclusively through Amie Street until December 17th.

The digital-download album features Juliette Lewis, The Walkmen and Youssou N’Dour, plus an unreleased track from Third Eye Blind and an exclusive cover track from Peter, Bjorn, & John.

Tamara Horton, our partner in this venture, and her colleagues came to us with this brilliant idea because she decided that “…rather than using our connections for great seats and backstage access, let’s use them in a way that will impact many, many others in a positive light for years to come. I’ve always been a fan of Malaria No More (thanks to the boys at FC Barcelona for bringing them on my radar!) and decided to reach out to them with our idea…”

And thus, a match made in music and humanitarian heaven was made. Every $10 album will help Malaria No More empower families in Africa to protect themselves and their children from the bite of a malarial mosquito by providing access to mosquito nets and effective medicines.

Learn more about the album and buy your copy today or give it as a holiday gift! There’s nothing better than giving the gift of music and helping to save lives at the same time. Children sleeping safely? That’s music to our ears…

The brilliant folks over at RED distribution have recorded a complication to support Malaria No More called “Indie Rocks! A Benefit Album For Malaria No More”. The album  is comprised of 14 songs from artists including Juliette Lewis, The Walkmen and Youssou N’Dour, in addition to an exclusive unreleased live track from Third Eye Blind and an exclusive cover track from Peter, Bjorn, & John.

The digital-only release will be available on November 17th exclusively through Amie Street—and RED and Amie Street will be donating 100% of the proceeds to Malaria No More. The digital-download album is $10, the same cost as a mosquito net that will help families in Africa protect their children from malaria.

Be sure to check back here or at Amie Street to download your copy starting next week!

Jessica Uno is winner of the World Briefing: Telling the Malaria Contest co-sponsored by Novartis Pharmaceutical Corporation and Malaria No More. Her winning essay earned her a trip to cover the MIM Pan-African Malaria Conference in Kenya and report back on the latest in the global effort to end malaria.

I am fortunate to be at this conference attending fascinating presentations and meeting so many incredible players on the malaria scene. The opportunity to  learn about their experiences and motivations has taught me so much about malaria in just a few days.

One of the first admirable individuals I interviewed was Caterina Capaccioli, head of Strategic Planning & Execution, Malaria Initiatives at Novartis. Caterina introduced me to the role that collaboration among different organizations—corporations, non profits, African miniseries of health and others—have played in successfully reducing the malaria burden. For example, Novartis has worked closely with the Chinese government to develop effective innovations.  Another example  is the partnership between organizations like Malaria No More who help distribute mosquito nets and those who produce and distribute antimalarial treatments, pairing prevention and treatment. One major advantage to such collaborations is the greater number of skills and resources available to unite against malaria.

Combining unique specialties among partners is necessary when facing the constantly evolving malaria threat. A united front is much stronger and efficient than many  individual effort!

Jessica’s trip to Kenya was supported by Novartis Pharmaceutical Corporation and Malaria No More.

Jessica Uno is winner of the World Briefing: Telling the Malaria Contest co-sponsored by Novartis Pharmaceutical Corporation and Malaria No More. Her winning essay earned her a trip to cover the MIM Pan-African Malaria Conference in Kenya and report back on the latest in the global effort to end malaria.

Ambassador Mark Green

Before I left for Nairobi, Emily from MNM set up a phone interview for me with Mark Green, executive director of Malaria No More’s Policy Center. Mr. Green recently finished serving as U.S. Ambassador to Tanzania and helped craft a number of policies and programs surrounding American foreign aid in women’s rights and health, AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. Ambassador Green’s impressive accomplishments and the fact that he was my first interview for this trip made me quite nervous about talking to him, but I was pleasantly surprised by his open and encouraging personality.

Ambassador Green has demonstrated his prowess in navigating policy related to Africa. His firsthand experiences living and working in Africa, personally suffering malaria, observing the child lives lost, families damaged, and economic productivity impaired by malaria have made him a skilled leader and policymaker. Ambassador Green described to me that until recently, malaria seemed an inevitable fact of life in Africa. However, we now know that malaria is highly treatable and preventable.

One point that stood out in our interview was the need to finish the job with malaria eradication. It is clear that we have the prevention and treatment tools that, when combined, are extremely effective in reducing malaria deaths. However, applying these tools to achieve our goal requires extended attention from the public, policymakers and leaders. According to Ambassador Green, some people would look at the statistic stating that malaria rates are less than 1% in Zanzibar and think “Oh, malaria’s not a problem anymore!” It is when this attitude takes hold however that malaria comes roaring back.

For those who aren’t familiar with malaria, it is a parasite that is transmitted by mosquitoes to humans. Once in a human, some of the parasites hide dormant in the body while others go out attacking, and so even if you clear a patient of the attacking parasites, the dormant ones are still there, capable of popping out unexpectedly and wreaking further havoc. Same in mosquitoes, not all of the parasites leave the mosquito when it bites a human. Thus, there are many ways the parasite persist in either human or mosquito hosts.

As Ambassador Green put it, “mosquitoes don’t respect national borders.” Until we completely stamp out the Plasmodium parasite, it will always be capable of returning with a vengeance, either through mosquitoes or humans. It’s an all or nothing battle. It requires commitment, but our progress so far has been extremely promising, and Ambassador Green believes that our efforts will be worthwhile during our lifetime. And the progress we make in fighting malaria and the surge of humanitarian energy such a victory would generate can be applied to thousands of causes elsewhere.

Jessica’s trip to Kenya was supported by Novartis Pharmaceutical Corporation and Malaria No More.

MNM's Scott Case and Driver David Brabham Show off the Car and the Nets!

This weekend, the boys over at Patron Highcroft Racing took the American Le Mans Series Championship! Congrats to drivers David Brabham and Scott Sharp, owner Duncan Dayton and COO Bryan MacDonald and the entire Highcroft team for their well-deserved victory!

And thanks to the Miles To End Malaria program, Highcroft’s win was a win against malaria as well. Right after the race, as the champagne started flowing, the team presented Malaria No More with a check for $63,133.13—enough to protect more than 1200 kids from malaria with life-saving mosquito nets.

The team worked all season to kick the malaria fight into high-gear, filming a PSA, participating in a charity auction and handing out with Melinda Doolittle to raise awareness.

Many thanks to the team for helping highlight the fight against malaria throughout the season and using their speed to accelerate the race to end malaria deaths.

Go Champs!

You’ve heard of “Text to Give”—but how about “Text to Live”?

Novartis has teamed up with Roll Back Malaria, Vodafone and IBM to design, develop and implement the SMS for Life pilot project in Tanzania to make sure all malaria patients have easy access to the life saving anti-malarial medication.

The first step to ending malaria deaths in Africa is to provide universal access to malaria control tools including nets, spraying and effective medicine—and when treating malaria, quick access to the right medicine is a matter of life or death.

SMS for Life harnesses the power of mobile technology to determine availability of medicine at health facilities and ensure that the need to replenish is communicated quickly and effectively.

In the pilot program, over 94% of all health facilities in the Lindi District of Tanzania are sending weekly updates on their stock via cell phone. If successful, this project could have far reaching benefits:  timely tracking and management of supplies means that medicine can arrive where they are most needed.

And that’s gr8.

Saint Isabel Orphanage and School (OSCI) in Luanda, Angola was recently awarded a $100,000 grant from ExxonMobil to help improve their facilities to better fight malaria and protect the children that stay there.

In addition, and in conjunction with American Idol finalist Elliott Yamin’s performance at the 1st Annual Washington Ideas Forum today, the ExxonMobil grant will also cover the launch of an art-based malaria prevention education program at OSCI.

Elliot, a champion in the fight against malaria, said:
When I visited Angola as part of Idol Gives Back, I saw how devastating malaria is in Africa and that there are some basic actions we can take to save lives. Saint Isabel provides hope and new lives for the children of Luanda, and I am very honored to support its efforts.

ExxonMobil does a lot of amazing work in the malaria space and we’re proud to work closely with them to end malaria deaths in Africa. Thanks to their support through American Idol’s Idol Gives Back, we’ve been able to expand our programs in Africa by strengthening country capacity and improving the delivery and use of malaria interventions.

We’ll continue to track the progress being made at OCSI and you can too by visiting their site.

Nigeria–the country that carries a THIRD of the world’s malaria burden—is part of a never-before-seen effort to aggressively cut malaria deaths within its borders. Thanks to huge investments by the World Bank, USAID and others, Nigeria is distributing 63 million mosquito nets in just 18 months.

See here a CNN report on the effort:

Melinda & Brabs

This weekend, I had the huge pleasure of traveling to Road Atlanta with American Idol alum—and Malaria No More supporter extraordinaire—Melinda Doolittle. Melinda was on hand to cheer the Patron Highcroft Race team and support their Miles To End Malaria program. During Saturday’s race, the team crossed the $50,000 fundraising mark and are still accepting donations at MilesToEndMalaria.org as they get ready for the last race of the season on October 10th in California.

The weekend was packed-full with drama. First, Highcroft suffered a crash during a practice run on Thursday. Luckily, no one was hurt and the team rebuilt the car, from the ground up, in 24 hours. The team effort was astounding!

Melinda joined us on Saturday morning to sing the national anthem (beautifully) and wave the green flag to signal the start of the race. We then slipped into fire suits and joined the team in the pit lane—an amazing experience.

To cap it off, Patron Highcroft Racing earned enough championship points to stay at the top of the leader board heading into the last race of the ALMS season.

Today at the United Nations, African Leaders will gather to launch the African Leaders Malaria Alliance, an influential forum for reviewing progress, addressing challenges and crafting solutions to meet malaria targets. The UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for Malaria, Ray Chambers, has noted that real malaria gains will only be made with support from the very top of government.

Many African presidents, including Paul Kagame of Rwanda and Jakaya Kikwete of Tanzania, have made malaria a priority in their countries and other African leaders are signaling their commitment to ending malaria deaths within their borders and across the African continent.

In this interview with Voice of America (mp3), Ray Chambers discusses progress in the fight against malaria and the common goal of ending preventable malaria deaths in Africa by 2015, as well as the economic benefits of defeating malaria.

And on BBC World Radio (mp3), Chambers notes that we’re at a unique moment in time, in which we have the tools and the resources to fight malaria. He says that he’s not aware of any other issue in which people from all walks of life—government, NGOs and individuals–have come together to battle a disease so successfully.

Learn more at the new website, www.ALMA2015.org.