An epidemiological study to assess the environmental and socio-cultural determinants of malaria in coastal Karnataka

Background: India has grappled with the problem of malaria since many decades. Moreover, Udupi district contributes 13% of malaria cases to Karnataka making it a significant public health concern. Objectives: To explore the socio-cultural and environmental factors that affect malaria incidence in Udupi. Methods: Areas with high annual incidence of malaria in Udupi city were selected for the study. A validated structured questionnaire was used for data collection. Study findings were expressed in frequencies and percentages. Results: Out of 315 households, 79.7% belonged to urban areas with 30.1% being graduates and above. In 14% of households, there was a malaria case in the past one year. The respondents were assessed for belief surrounding malaria and most of the respondents (80.3%) agreed that malaria is a severe disease that needs treatment. On assessing for treatment seeking behaviour, the majority of the respondents preferred private clinics (58.7%). On probing for prevention practices, most respondents (89.8%) preferred indoor residuals spraying. Only 31% of the respondents were found to be using bed nets at night. Almost 8.9% of the houses had completely uncovered windows thus facilitating the entry of mosquito indoors. Majority of the respondents were found to have open wells in close proximity to their homes(71.4%). Conclusion: It was found that despite having adequate knowledge regarding, malaria people do not adhere to the prevention strategies. The socio-cultural, housing and environmental factors were found to favour mosquito breeding and biting with potentiality of malaria transmission.