Our research themes

We existed to help end malaria. When the ACT Consortium started, there was a good research pipeline of antimalarials in response to the rapid spread of drug resistant malaria, however there was very little evidence on how these drugs should best be deployed. 

Our research focused around four major themes:

1. Access: Only a fraction of those who need a malaria drug receive one. A number of barriers to treatment exist, especially for the poorest families, where a large proportion cannot access any formal healthcare.
   
   
2. Targeting: Malaria is the most common reason given for illness and admission to hospital in many African countries. However, malaria is often overdiagnosed or misdiagnosed in the absence of proper testing.
   
   
3. Safety: Despite the wide scale use of ACTs, little is known about their long-term effects. It is important to consolidate the safety profiles of these drugs to document both known and previously unobserved side effects.
   
   
4. Quality: The impact of improved delivery of ACTs will be undermined if the drugs are of suspect quality. This could be due to counterfeiting, substandard manufacturing or simply degradation due to poor or prolonged storage.

Policy-makers have had to make major decisions on how best to deploy ACTs with little or no relevant evidence. We hopde to answer key questions on ACT delivery so that policy-makers have the evidence they need. 

Download a summary of findings from our research or browse through more than 100 peer reviewed publications.