Global Fund says Kenya was sold 14 million substandard mosquito nets 

Global Fund says Kenya was sold 14 million substandard mosquito nets 

According to a report by Global Fund, it has been found that between 2017 and 2018, millions of Kenyans were provided with defective mosquito nets.  

Among other reasons, the nets have been blamed for the increase in malaria cases in Kenya as well as other countries that were issued with the same nets.   

The report further noted that close to 14.9 defective million mosquito nets were distributed in Kenya during the said period for alleged prevention of mosquito bites that cause and increase malaria. 

In the middle of the storm is a Pakistan citizen who is a manufacturer of Dawa-Plus nets, who infused the nets with very ineffective chemicals and the nets were equally made from cheap rickety materials.   

Furthermore, the Kenya Medical Supplies Authority has been blamed for disregarding these deficiencies and going ahead to get nets continuously from the manufacturer, Tana Netting, overlooking reports on quality controls. 

The findings which have been made public by the Global Fund follow the warning that was made to the affected countries in March 2018.    

Mosquito nets aid in physically preventing bites from mosquitoes and adding chemicals further helps to keep mosquitoes away by killing them.

But the nets that were sent to Kenya were found to tear off quickly and their ability to keep away the mosquitoes was low. They were also outside the stipulated product specifications because of the low dosage of necessary chemicals.  

Although the problem of the defective nets was discovered in 2018, they had already been procured thus were distributed across the country. 

20 other African countries were also supplied with faulty nets. The report further noted that Global Fund had listed Tana Netting as prequalified for supplying the nets and committed to quality controls but went ahead to flout the same rules.  

Global Fund laid blame on Kemsa which is taken with procuring the nets in Kenya. In equal measure, GF admitted its failure to carefully establish necessary checks to control and establish whether Kemsa and the National Treasury which are the Principal Recipient of GF funds were committed to testing and controls.