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Only about 52 people in Ghana are thought to have died of malaria in 2025, according to figures from the Ghana Health Service.
That is a 98% fall since 2011.
In April, Dr Nana Yaw Peprah, Deputy Programme Manager of Ghana's National Malaria Elimination Programme, told journalists that a malaria free Ghana was "within reach", VaccinesWork reported on 14 October 2026.
The Ghana Health Service puts the drop at 3,259 deaths in 2011 to 52 in 2025, which means that for every 100 people who died of malaria in 2011, about two died in 2025.
The National Malaria Elimination Programme presented the figures at a press briefing in Accra, the capital, on 23 April 2026, ahead of World Malaria Day.
From 28% to 8.6%
The programme's data show malaria risk falling from 28% in 2011 to about 8.6% now, the Ghana News Agency reported from the briefing.
Transmission continues across the country, with differences between regions.
Greater Accra, the region that includes the capital, has the lowest rate at about 2%, while other regions report higher levels.
Children under five and pregnant women remain the most vulnerable groups.
Dr Elisabeth Tabitha Abbew, head of the infectious diseases department at Cape Coast Teaching Hospital in southern Ghana, told VaccinesWork that her hospital has not recorded a patient whose death was caused by malaria in the last two years.
VaccinesWork is the news site of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, which helps pay for vaccines in poorer countries, and the interview was part of a report by Claudia Lacave.
Dr Abbew said a few patients who died there did have the malaria parasite in their blood, but malaria was not the main cause of death.
Deaths down, cases still high
In 2024, Ghana recorded about 4.3 million confirmed malaria cases out of more than 12 million suspected cases, according to the programme's data.
Dr Peprah said testing in health facilities has reached nearly 99%, but fewer than half of suspected cases were confirmed as malaria.
The Ghana News Agency reported that this indicates many fevers are still being wrongly classified as malaria.
How far each tool reaches
The programme gave coverage figures for several tools:
- Seasonal preventive medicine, given to children during the high risk months, reached about 92% of targeted children, and most completed the full doses.
- About 89% of pregnant women received at least one dose of preventive treatment, though completion of later doses remains low.
- Nets treated with insecticide reached about 87% of the target in mass distribution and 85% through health facilities and schools.
- Malaria vaccine uptake stands at about 75% for first doses and about 60% for later doses.
Dr Franklin Asiedu-Bekoe, Director of the Ghana Health Service's Public Health Division, named underuse of nets, despite wide distribution, as a major challenge.
Dr Emmanuel Boateng, head of diagnostics and treatment at the programme, told VaccinesWork that the vaccine pilot reached children who were not using nets.
What the vaccine study found
Ghana began giving the malaria vaccine in 2019 in a pilot that also included Kenya and Malawi.
The Ghana Health Service says two vaccines, RTS,S and R21, are now part of routine child immunisation.
A study in The Lancet in May 2026 compared areas that introduced the vaccine in 2019 with areas that waited.
Among children old enough to have had three doses, deaths from any cause other than injuries were 13% lower where the vaccine was used, about one in eight deaths prevented.
The study did not measure malaria deaths alone and covered all three countries.
About four in 10 children had received the fourth dose by 2022.
The study was funded by the World Health Organization (WHO), Gavi, the Global Fund and Unitaid.
