Abstract

Malaria remains a major cause of mortality among children under the age of five years; it is endemic throughout Nigeria with seasonal variation in different geographic zones of the country. Malaria prevalence studies had been undertaken in many parts of Nigeria but there is probably no data available from the far North Western region. This research study was undertaken to determine the prevalence, monthly distribution of malaria in Sokoto, North Western Nigeria in order to generate base-line information. A total of 1,297 blood samples were collected by simple random sampling, from patients attending the two health centres over the twelve calendar months. Thick and thin blood films were Giemsa stained and observed for the presence of malaria parasites. A total of 354 (27.29%) were positive for malaria parasites with the highest prevalence rate being recorded in the month of August with 72 (59.5%) positive cases and the month of March having the least infection rate of 9 (9.18%). The infection rate according to gender showed that males had the higher infection rate of 192 (n = 635) or 30.24% than the females who had a total 162 infection (n = 662) or 24.47%. The age group 0 - 5 years had the highest infection rate of 123 (43.77%) while the age group 36 - 40 years had the least infection rate of 10 (9.8%). The study has revealed the presence of malaria transmission throughout the year in Sokoto, North Western Nigeria and the infection rate can be considered as moderately high.

Key words: Malaria, prevalence, Plasmodium falciparum.