Data Collector at Malaria Consortium

Project Background

• Perennial malaria chemoprevention (PMC) formerly intermittent preventive treatment in infants (IPTi) is the administration of preventive antimalarial drugs to children to provide personal protection against malaria where transmission rates are moderate to high and parasite resistance to SP is not high. Under current WHO guidelines, the drug sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (SP) is delivered to children aged <24 months during routine immunization services and other possible avenues. PMC is safe, cost-effective, well accepted by health workers and communities, and has been found to reduce clinical malaria by 30%, and episodes of anaemia by 21% (Cairns et al., 2008).
• Despite the WHO recommendation there has been limited uptake to date. The intervention is not yet adopted as one of the interventions in the Nigerian Malaria Control Policy. A rapid assessment of stakeholders’ perspective on barriers to PMC policy uptake in Nigeria revealed that providing evidence on feasibility, acceptability, and effectiveness of the intervention at field level will be key for policy uptake.
• Malaria Consortium received funding to carry out an effectiveness-implementation hybrid project on feasibility and effectiveness of on PMC in Nigeria. It is aimed at generating the required evidence to inform policy and possible scale up of PMC in Nigeria, and ultimately contribute towards a reduction in under 5 mortalities in the country. The project – a four-year commitment became effective on the 1st of November 2020 – will be carried out in Osun State. It is a hybrid design aimed at evaluating the effectiveness as well as feasibility of delivering PMC through the expanded programme on immunization (EPI) platform.
• While SP-PMC has been shown to be efficacious and to provide considerable protection against malaria and anaemia in young children, SP-PMC could have an even greater impact on malaria burden than previously demonstrated. Proving the effectiveness of SP-PMC and feasibility by addressing any critical root causes preventing adoption of PMC in Nigeria will catalyse policy adoption and implementation in the country; contributing to a decrease in malaria burden in young children, particularly the poorest and most vulnerable, and ultimately to a reduction in under-5 morbidity and mortality. SP-PMC policy could be implemented sub-nationally to provide increased protection against malaria among young children living in areas which are not eligible for seasonal malaria chemoprevention (SMC).

Purpose of the Assignment:

• Carry out a cost-description of the introduction and roll-out of PMC. Conduct a cost-effectiveness analysis of the PMC intervention, including a cost-benefit analysis.

Methodology:

• The cost analyses will be done from a health systems perspective that entails quantification of what it will cost the Ministry of Health/NMEP to carry out the intervention, and focusing on direct costs (medical and non-medical).
• Costing will involve the quantification of inputs and assignment of appropriate resource values; discounting future costs and assigning appropriate annualized costs to capital inputs; and valuing resources when market prices deviate from the actual value of resources.

Direct costs will include:

• capital costs (e.g. Planning costs, Consensus building and meetings, Initial training, Vehicles, Equipment and furniture), and
• Recurrent costs (e.g. Personnel (including additional cost for administering drug), Fuel/Maintenance of vehicles, Office/warehouse rental, Supplies/overheads, and Management cost).
• The data should be used for the cost description, cost-benefit and cost-effectiveness analyses.

Scope of work
Phase 3: February - October 2025:

• Costing analysis will be done for PMC implementation of drug (SP) administration at the health facility during routine immunization and non-immunization visits, while EPI-only cost will be captured from the control arm.
• Also, costs will be aggregated into startup and maintenance cost to provide further information that will be important for policy decision making.
• In addition, interphase with Northwestern University (NWU) for the modelling component of the analysis. Stakeholders’ engagement through Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) to provide additional data not provided from other sources.

Specific tasks for data collectors (6)
Phase 3: February - October 2025:

• Attend study briefing by the consultant
• Conduct KIIs on cost effectiveness data collection
• Submit typed transcripts of interviews.

Person Specification State Data collectors

• OND / HND or Diploma in a relevant academic field
• At least 2 years experience in qualitative data collection
• Ability to transcribe and code data using computer software.

Engagement and Compensations

• Please note that all terms will be discussed and agreed with the project lead. Each contract signed is valid for a phase with possibility of renewal.
• For your expertise and input, you will be paid at the end of each phase. But payments are subject to satisfactory and timely completion of all assigned deliverables and will be according to Malaria Consortium’s finance policies.