The pioneering study of Mass Drug Administration with Primaquine in Iran

Abstract Mass drug administration (MDA) is considered one of the WHO's Global Strategies to eliminate malaria. Therefore, we aimed to evaluate the impact of this achievement on reducing malaria transmission. Primaquine was chosen as an antimalarial drug for this purpose; then, a total of 168 Pakistani cases receiving MDA were examined from September to December 2021 (for 8 weeks) in the Lirdaf district of Jask county, Hormozgan province, south of Iran. Three asymptomatic vivax malaria carriers were detected. 30 out of the 168 people treated with primaquine, were excluded from the study; Considering that, 26 of them had G6PD deficiency. Three people were eliminated from the project, one due to family problems, and the other two due to access constraints. One person, who was positive and also asymptomatic at the beginning of the study, became positive again; so, this case was disregarded from the survey. All cases were followed up routinely; and interestingly, no relapse was observed in our target population. We suggested that MDA should be implemented in the elimination phase associated with other interventions.