Funding for the mosquito net project will come from a five-year $1.2 billion program initiated in 2005 to reduce by 50 percent malaria deaths in 15 African nations. Bush said vouchers were distributed for 5.2 million mosquito nets to be sold with hefty discounts, aimed at providing protection to pregnant Tanzanian women and their infants and young children.
Aside from the mosquito net distribution, the program also will distribute insecticides to African homes, make available specialized medical treatment for malaria victims and offer a combined medical therapy for those already infected.
Since the program started in 2005, dramatic results have been achieved in some areas. In Zanzibar, incidents of infant malaria infection has plunged to 1 percent from 20 percent, Bush said.
The continent's 70 to 80 percent humidity and 103-degree average temperature are perfect breeding climates for malaria-carrying mosquitoes.
In Rwanda, it was no longer health maladies that Bush wanted stamped out, but ethnic slaughter that still goes on in Darfur. The U.S. president called on other countries to help erase ethnic violence in the region.
Bush said, "The Rwanda people know the horrors of genocide... My message to other nations is: 'Join with the president and help us get this problem solved once and for all' And we will help."
Around $100 million has been committed by the U.S. to train and equip peacekeepers from various African countries deployed to Darfur. It has spent over $17 million in training 7,000 Rwandan soldiers and funding their equipment purchase and transport to Darfur.
