Knowledge and practices on malaria in Tubu village, in a malaria-endemic area in northern Botswana: implications for interventions.

Background: Health education based on understanding community and individual knowledge, attitudes and practices on malaria is gaining momentum as one of the methods for malaria control. The purpose of the survey was to assess peoples' knowledge and perceptions on malaria in order to generate information to contribute to the malaria elimination programme being implemented by the Ministry of Health of Botswana.

Materials and methods: A cross-sectional structured questionnaire-based survey and participatory rural appraisals were conducted to assess the knowledge and practices regarding malaria among all the 71 households of Tubu village, located on the fringes of the Okavango Delta. Relative frequencies were calculated using the SPSS version 20.0 package.

Results: Information dissemination by the Government through different structures, by the media as well as individuals in the community, played a vital role in making the community aware of malaria. Respondents showed some basic knowledge on malaria transmission (95.8%), signs and symptoms (88.7%) and prevention measures (98.6%). They associated malaria with rainfall, floods and harvesting. Respondents indicated that mosquitoes were abundant in grassy areas (60.6%) and stagnant waters (59.2%). 98.6% of the respondents said insecticide-treated bednets were the main method for malaria prevention. As the first option, all respondents who had a history of a malaria episode visited the clinic and not traditional medical practitioners. However, there were few respondents (14.1%) with misconceptions on malaria aspects like where mosquitoes breed.

Conclusions: Generally, the high level of awareness and good practices shown by the community were ideal for sustainable implementation of community-based malaria intervention programmes. Misconceptions on malaria need to be corrected as these may have some detrimental effects on the Ministry of Health's goal of malaria elimination in Botswana by 2016.