From Benjamin Mensah, GNA Special Correspondent, New York

New York, Sept 25, GNA - President John Atta Mills has praised the launch of a UN Initiative for an alliance to fight malaria and appealed to African nations to collaborate to eliminate the disease that had become a development issue.

He said despite some progress made in the fight against the disease, its elimination was not moving fast enough and the alliance had come in as a stimulus package to eradicate the disease. The Initiative, called the Africa-led Malaria Alliance that was mooted by Tanzania President Jakaya Kikwete, would provide a high level forum to ensure efficient procurement, distribution and utilisation of malaria control interventions. It would also facilitate the sharing of effective malaria control practices and ensure that malaria remains high on the global policy agenda.

Ghana regards malaria as a major killer and it accounts for more deaths among children under five. It accounts for one quarter of all deaths of children below five years in Africa. Fifty million pregnant women are affected by it and more than 500,000 women die of the disease each year.

The disease is also a major economic burden in Africa, accounting for 40 per cent of health care spending in endemic areas, costing the continent 12 billion dollars a year. President Mills, in a contribution at the launch that was on the sidelines of the UN 64th General Assembly, said the alliance was in the right direction to ensure a healthy nation. He said the search for a healthy nation was in the interest of development and that the Alliance had Ghana's fullest support.