map is an international research collaboration that tracks the global fight against malaria.
We combine innovative data and analytics, global collaboration, and local engagement to deliver insights for impactful malaria policy and control.
analytics
for a malaria-free world
WHO WE ARE
Since its inception in 2006, the MAP collaboration has comprised of many scientists working in groups around the world. Today, MAP has a core team based at the Kids Research Institute Australia and Curtin University in Perth, Western Australia, and Ifakara Health Institute in Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, and has members in Europe, the United States, Africa and Asia.
MAP is also a designated World Health Organization Collaborating Centre in Geospatial Disease Modelling. Though this partnership we provide modelling and analysis both directly to the WHO Global Malaria Program and via WHO to individual countries.”
Our Story
START SCROLLING
2006
MAP is launched by Professors Bob Snow and Simon Hay. Teams at Oxford and the KEMRI-Wellcome Trust in Nairobi, supported by global collaborators, set about addressing the critical shortfall in spatial intelligence on global malaria endemicity.
2009
MAP publishes the world’s first global map of Plasmodium falciparum malaria endemicity based on empirical data and formal statistical methods.
2012
The MAP portfolio expands with new globals maps of P. vivax endemicity and P. falciparum clinical incidence.
2013
Under the leadership of Professor Peter Gething, MAP receives its first support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the UK Medical Research Council. MAP also becomes a WHO Collaborating Centre in Geospatial Disease Modelling.
2015
MAP publishes a landmark study evaluating the impact of malaria control in Africa during the MDG era, and works with partners to successfully advocate for renewed politcal commitments.
2016
MAP joins the Global Burden of Disease study, partnering with the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation to generate annual burden of disease estimates for malaria.
2019
Major new funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to expand MAP’s work into support for national program. The MAP Oxford team relocates to the Kids Research Institute Australia and Curtin University, in Perth, Western Australia.
2020
MAP advisory board is formed to provide independent expertise guidance on both strategic and scientific matters.
2021
MAP provides crucial evaluation of potential for COVID-19 pandemic to derail progress in Africa. With strong advocacy and support from WHO and the global community, national programs are able to overcome immense challenges to maintain critical malaria control.
2023
MAP establishes an East Africa Node at Ifakara Health Institute in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, led by Dr Susan Rumisha. Driving African research & innovation in geospatial analytics for malaria to generate robust evidence to guide malaria decisions.
2024
MAP grows with new endemic country partners joining the program.
funding
partners
The Malaria Atlas Project and this web portal are principally funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
We also gratefully acknowledge support from the Channel 7 Telethon Trust, Western Australia and the United States Agency for International Development/President’s Malaria Initiative. MAP has previously been supported by the Wellcome Trust and the UK Medical Research Council.
KEY PARTNERS
The Malaria Atlas Project works extensively in partnership with a wide range of academic, policy and malaria control stakeholders. Some of our most enduring and important partnerships include the following organisations:
World Health Organization Global Malaria Programme
The World Health Organization Global Malaria Programme (WHO-GMP), based at the Geneva WHO headquarters, is responsible for coordinating WHO’s global efforts to control and eliminate malaria.
This includes setting and disseminating global guidance and policies on malaria control and elimination; supporting countries in formulation of national malaria strategic plans, strengthening of their surveillance systems, and responding to biological and operational emergencies. As part of its core mandate, GMP keeps independent score of global progress in the fight against malaria. MAP is a WHO Collaborating Centre in Geospatial Disease Modelling and under this remit we provide broad ranging analyses to WHO, including in burden estimation, intervention coverage tracking and risk stratification.
Clinton Health Access Initiative
The Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) is a global health organization committed to strengthening integrated health systems in the developing world and expanding access to care and treatment for HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.
CHAI is supporting a number of countries in Southern Africa, South-East Asia, Hispaniola and Mesoamerica to sustainably accelerate efforts to eliminate indigenous cases of malaria by providing direct technical and management support to governments on elimination planning, surveillance, and targeted attached and response activities. MAP works with CHAI to support countries in their effort to map risk, evaluate intervention impact and access to care, and forecast malaria commodity needs.
Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation
The Institute for Health Metric and Evaluation (IHME), based at the University of Washington in Seattle has the stated mission of delivering to the world timely, relevant, and scientifically valid evidence to improve health policy and practice.
Their flagship project is the Global Burden of Disease study: a comprehensive global effort analysing 286 causes of death, 369 diseases and injuries, and 87 risk factors in 204 countries and territories. MAP works with IHME to generate the malaria component of the GBD study each year, providing detailed estimates of malaria prevalence, incidence, and mortality. In parallel with the GBD study, we also collaborate closely with Professor Dave Smith and his team at IHME with a focus on mathematical modelling of malaria to support intervention planning.
Institute for Disease Modelling
The Institute for Disease Modelling (IDM) is part of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Global Health Division. IDM’s goal is to support global efforts to eradicate infectious diseases and achieve permanent improvements in health by developing, using, and sharing computational modelling tools and promoting quantitative decision-making. MAP works closely with IDM on work at the interface between malaria geospatial and mathematical modelling.
ACREME
The Australian Centre of Research Excellence in Malaria Elimination (ACREME) is a network of leading malaria researchers dedicated to realising the goal of eliminating malaria in the region by 2030. ACREME is developing better tools to monitor, detect, prevent, and treat malaria, in order to improve health and economic outcomes for our regional neighbours, with research conducted within the three major themes of surveillance, diagnostics, and treatment and prevention. MAP joined ACREME following our relocation to Australia in 2019 and is a proud member of this vibrant Australian malaria research community.
Vector Atlas
The Vector Atlas is a University of Oxford, International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (icipe) and Malaria Atlas Project initiative, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Building on the extensive vector (occurrence, bionomics and insecticide resistance) datasets collated as part of the Malaria Atlas Project, the Vector Atlas is a new sister initiative focused entirely on updating the vector data for the dominant and secondary vector species that maintain malaria transmission in Africa. The datasets will now include information on local ecology (e.g. flora and livestock), human activity relevant to malaria transmission and the genetic mechanisms that underlie the phenotypic insecticide resistance reported within vector populations.
These data will be used to develop new vector species, IR and abundance maps to provide a solid, evidence-based suite of surfaces for use in vector control decision making. The analyses-ready data and updated maps will be available on our Vector Atlas platform. The Vector Atlas is also working closely with our national partners in Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Uganda and Senegal. Bespoke spatial models developed in collaboration with in-country experts will be specifically tailored for each national malaria control programme to target the unique challenges in vector control currently faced in each of these high burden countries.