Malaria tran
smitted by female
anopheles
mosquitoes is a major cause of death in many developing
countries of the world.
In Nigeria, malaria prevalence is as high as 80
to
85% and is the most common
cause of outpatient visits to health facilities.
The malaria situation
in Nigeria is very burdensome and it
impedes human development. The degree of malaria infestation varies from region to region in Nigeria.
This spatial attribute of malaria infestation
across
regions
necessitate
the needs for malaria mapping
among researc
hers. Also,
the rate of malaria infection across space depends on dynamic processes
involving complex climatic, environmental, physical, and social variables operating
differently
in space.
This complexity makes the analysis of the spatial pattern of malar
ia infection in Nigeria important. Such
analysis can explain the variations, providing a basis for policy intervention.
It is against this
background that this paper examines the spatial patterns of malaria infestation in Nigeria. Malaria data
for fifteen
years (1993
to
2007) were collected from the
World Health Organisation (
WHO
)
Data Bank,
Roll Back Malaria/Epidemiological
Unit
of both the Federal and State Ministries of Health for twenty
-
three states in Nigeria. The pattern of spatial variation in the ra
te of malaria infection was analyzed
using
principal component analysis
(PCA). The
results indicate
that
seasonal variations play
significant
roles in malaria infection in Nigeria. It also shows high concentration of malaria infections in some few
states.
Th
is
paper therefore recommends that deliberate
effort should be made to increase the
distribution of treated
mosquito
nets and drugs in the affected states and an increment in the financial
allocation to the affected states by the Federal Ministry of Heal
th with a few to reducing the effect of the
disease in the affected states.