The Malaria Atlas Project (MAP) housed at Telethon Kids Institute and Curtin University in Perth, Australia, has announced a AU$16 million ($10.6 million) grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The foundation is a longtime supporter of MAP, which houses the world’s largest malaria database. The latest grant will be used to generate the annual geospatial malaria modeling and analytics that describe the global landscape of malaria transmission, infection, morbidity, mortality, and intervention coverage. In addition, in an effort to decentralize and help develop capacity in affected countries, a portion of the grant will establish a new MAP Node in the East African region, housed within the Ifakara Health Institute in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. To be led by MAP senior research fellow Susan Rumisha, the East Africa MAP Node will operate in close alignment with the Perth Node, which is led by Kerry M Stokes, chair in child health at Curtin University, and Telethon Kids Institute professor Peter Gething.

“Their vision of a malaria-free world is one we are passionately committed to, and we are incredibly excited to extend our mission over the next four years to bring the world closer to this goal,” said Gething.

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