Alice Nekesa, a 28-year-old farmer from Uganda, never imagined that a silent threat would shatter her dreams of welcoming a second child. Last year, in the fourth month of her pregnancy, she began bleeding unexpectedly. The tragedy that followed—a miscarriage—was later attributed to undiagnosed and untreated malaria. “Because I didn’t discover malaria and treat it early,” Nekesa lamented, she lost what would have been her second child. Her story, though heartbreaking, is far from unique in Uganda and across much of Africa.
Malaria remains the deadliest disease on the continent, but for years, a glaring gap existed in how newborns and tiny infants—those most vulnerable—could be treated. That gap, however, may finally be closing thanks to a major medical breakthrough. In July 2025, Swiss medical regulators approved a new malaria medicine specifically designed for babies weighing between 2 and 5 kilograms (about 4.5 to 11 pounds). Developed by Novartis, the Basel-based pharmaceutical company, the medicine is known as Coartem Baby in some countries and Riamet Baby in others. Its approval, coordinated with the World Health Organization (WHO) under a fast-track process, is being hailed as a “major leap forward for saving the lives of young children in countries affected by malaria,” according to the Malaria Consortium, a London-based nonprofit.
For decades, health workers in Uganda, Nigeria, Congo, and beyond have faced the same dilemma: how to treat infants with malaria when existing drugs were formulated for older children or adults. Adjusting dosages was risky, and overdoses or toxicity were real dangers. “Variations of such cases are commonly reported by Ugandan health workers who witness stillbirths or feverish babies that die within days from undiagnosed malaria,” reported the Associated Press.
Now, the new drug offers a tailored solution. Coartem Baby is a sweet-tasting tablet that dissolves into a syrup when dropped into liquids like water or breast milk—making it easy to administer to even the tiniest patients. Some private pharmacies in Uganda already stock the medicine, flavored with orange or mango to appeal to infants, though it’s not yet available in public hospitals as of August 2025. Ugandan authorities say its public rollout is imminent as they work to update national clinical guidelines for malaria treatment.
The stakes could hardly be higher. According to the WHO, Africa’s 1.5 billion people accounted for 95% of the estimated 597,000 malaria deaths worldwide in 2023. More than three-quarters of those deaths were among children. In Uganda alone—a country of 45 million—there were 12.6 million malaria cases and nearly 16,000 deaths last year, with many victims being children under five and pregnant women.
Nigeria, Congo, and Uganda are the African countries most burdened by malaria, a parasitic disease transmitted by mosquitoes that thrive in stagnant water. During Uganda’s biannual “malaria season,” which coincides with the rainy periods, government-run health centers fill with long lines of sick patients—many of them women with babies strapped to their backs, desperate for help. Health workers are now being trained to consider malaria as a potential cause of illness in newborns, even when other dangerous conditions like sepsis are present. “If they don’t expand their investigations to also suspect malaria, then it goes unnoticed,” explained Ronald Serufusa, the top malaria official for Uganda’s Wakiso district, which borders the capital, Kampala.
Before the arrival of Coartem Baby, the only option for infants was to administer antimalarial drugs meant for older children, with painstaking dosage adjustments to avoid overdose or toxicity. The new medicine, a lower-dose version of an already-approved tablet, fills a critical gap. “The development of Coartem Baby has given hope to many,” Serufusa said. He believes it will be available “very, very soon,” with one priority being to educate the public about the importance of adhering to proper treatment.
The medicine’s rollout is not limited to Uganda. According to the Malaria Consortium, Coartem Baby will soon be available in Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, and Tanzania as well. This regional approach is crucial, as malaria knows no borders in sub-Saharan Africa.
Yet, the fight against malaria is not just about new medicines. Funding remains a persistent challenge. Earlier this year, the United States reduced its foreign aid program, leading to a loss of support for Uganda’s malaria initiatives. Despite this setback, Jane Nabakooza, a pediatrician with Uganda’s malaria control program, expects the government will provide Coartem Baby free of charge to patients. “We are focusing on those that are actually prone to severe forms of malaria and malaria deaths, and these are children under five years,” Nabakooza said. Some funding from international sources, such as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis, remains available for vital programs like indoor spraying to control mosquito populations.
As the new drug makes its way into the hands of health workers, training is ramping up to ensure that malaria is suspected and tested for even in newborns with ambiguous symptoms. The hope is that stories like Alice Nekesa’s will become far less common. The Malaria Consortium described the approval of Coartem Baby as “a major leap forward for saving the lives of young children in countries affected by malaria.”
Photographs taken in July and August 2025 at Wakiso Health Centre IV in Uganda show the human face of this struggle: a child receiving a vaccine shot, a health worker speaking to patients, a mother breastfeeding her newborn, and Alice Nekesa herself, quietly determined to protect her family from a disease that has claimed too many.
As Uganda and its neighbors prepare to roll out this new weapon against malaria, the sense of hope is palpable. The journey is far from over, but with innovations like Coartem Baby, the fight against malaria in Africa has taken a decisive step forward.
