The bednets worth GHC21, 525 Ghana Cedis is to help reduce the rate at which pregnant women, children under five years and infants get infected with Malaria in the area.

 Mr Robert Siaw, Sustainable Development Manager, said the celebration of the day, under the theme “Ending Malaria for God” was a way to highlight global effects and the need to sustain commitments towards the fight against the disease.

He said malaria was not just a disease commonly associated with poverty, but also a cause of poverty and that  it had negative effects on regions where is wide spread.

Mr Siaw said when one is down with malaria his work output and income is reduced and the household is plunged into a vicious cycle of poverty and economic deprivation.

He said there were some countries which had malaria, but that currently the disease was no more due to the collective efforts by the citizenry.

He said Ghanaians could also eliminate the disease in the country if the citizens  changed their behaviour towards the little things that they did to facilitate the breeding of the  mosquito.

The sustainable development manager said Goldfields would continue to work with like-minded institutions and civil society groups to reduce malaria incidence in their operation communities.

He said the company would organise malaria quiz competition for four schools in Prestea Huni/ Valley and Tarkwa Nsueam constituencies to climax this year's celebration on May 26.

The competing schools include; Huniso Pepesa District/Assembly Junior High School (JHS), Huniso D/A JHS, Richard Graema JHS and John Taylor JHS.

He urged the teachers in all the participating schools to prepare adequately for the contest as there were ‘interesting prizes’ available.

Dr Ishmael Sackey,  Manager, Health Services, Goldfields explained that  per the latest World Health Organisation estimates, released in December 2016, there were 212 million cases of malaria in 2015 with 429,000 deaths.

He said between 2010 and 2015 malaria incidence among populations at risk fell by 21 per cent globally and during the same period, malaria mortality rate decreased by 29 per cent.

Dr Sackey said an estimated 6.8 million deaths had been averted globally since 2011, adding that with Goldfields performance on malaria control, it had resulted in the reduction of cases since 2014 to date with zero deaths within the period.

He called on Ghanaians to sleep under treated bednets and ensure that they kept their environment clean.