With several countries in Asia Pacific close to reaching falciparum-malaria elimination, last mile challenges including residual malaria, drug resistance and radical cure for vivax malaria are of critical importance. Whereas national malaria programs and their partners essentially have the tools to address remaining challenges to elimination, challenges persist in using these tools in an integrated, holistic manner. 

Community engagement—defined as a participatory process in which communities are actively involved in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of malaria programs—has potential to help NMCPs overcome remaining hurdles. Whereas community engagement has become an integral component of successful public health programming in HIV and other health areas, it has not yet been fully integrated into malaria elimination efforts. A recent global review found that community engagement is often misunderstood by malaria professionals as equivalent to community-based interventions or social and behavior change communication (SBCC)—whereas in actuality, community engagement refers to a more holistic and integrated approach to jointly designing, delivering and assessing malaria programs together with active and meaningful participation from communities at risk. 

In this context, the APMEN Vector Control Working Group (VCWG) organized an online workshop in July 2020 to discuss opportunities to engage communities at multiple stages of elimination programming on 15 July 2020. Expert speaker presentations and facilitated discussion with participants—representing NMCPs, community engagement experts, global health partners and academic institutions active in the region—around these four opportunity areas contributed to the distillation of key learnings and issues to explore further outlined.

Opportunity 1: Understanding the needs and preferences of communities

Opportunity 2: Generating demand for consistent use of vector control products using approaches, terms and formats that resonate with communities at risk

Opportunity 3: Distributing vector control interventions through channels that are conveniently accessible to communities at risk

Opportunity 4: Monitoring, evaluating and refining vector control programming to meet the needs of communities at risk