Pushing Malaria Elimination Outdoors

As a warming world opens new territory for mosquitoes to thrive, the front line is shifting outdoors as the fight against mosquitoes reaches streets, fields, and waterways, experts said at the Devex Impact House @ UNGA81.

Climate change is redrawing the map. Warmer temperatures, longer rainy seasons, and more frequent flooding are expanding the areas where mosquitoes can survive, bringing diseases like dengue and malaria to cities, high-altitude regions, and areas that previously had little reason for concern. At the same time, mosquitoes themselves are altering their behavior. Many now bite outdoors during the late afternoon or early morning hours—when people are cooking, commuting, or gathering outside, far beyond the reach of bed nets.

At the Devex Impact House during the 81st United Nations General Assembly in September 2026, experts from Valent Health discussed strategies to target outdoor-biting mosquitoes.

Expanding protection outdoors means hunting down standing water where mosquitoes breed—from clogged gutters to discarded tires—and stopping the insects before they reach the doorstep.

This approach also calls for embedding mosquito control into the everyday business of managing cities. Public works such as road construction, drainage maintenance, and waste management must pay closer attention to standing water and blocked drainage, which serve as quiet breeding grounds for mosquitoes. Integrating these checks into routine operations can turn existing municipal services into a steady line of defense without the expense of building entirely new programs from scratch.

Programs can start small in densely populated urban areas, coastal communities, or other high-risk zones, scaling up once they prove effective.

In tourist destinations where mosquitoes threaten visitor health and local reputations, a portion of tourism taxes could help fund control efforts. In agricultural regions, where irrigation channels and flooded rice fields act as prime breeding grounds, agricultural cooperatives could also contribute to these initiatives.

(Photo by Cầu Đường Việt Nam from Pexels)