Methods
malaria
HAND INFECTION, MALARIA, MAY, MALARIA, REGRESSION
A two-arm quasi-experimental, open-label prospective non-randomized control trial (nRCT) was conducted in three districts. In two intervention districts, 85,000 children aged 3–59 months were targeted to receive monthly courses of SMC using SPAQ during the peak transmission season (May to September) 2021. A third district served as a control, where SMC was not implemented. Communities with comparable malaria attack rates were selected from the three districts, and households with at least one SMC-eligible child were purposively selected. A total cohort of 600 children (200 children per district) were selected and followed using passive surveillance for breakthrough confirmed malaria episodes during the five-month peak transmission season. Malaria incidence rate per person-months and number of malaria episodes among children in the two arms were compared. Kaplan–Meier failure estimates were used to compare the probability of a positive malaria test. Other factors that may influence malaria transmission and infection among children in the two arms were also assessed using multivariable cox proportional hazards regression model.