Giving mothers-to-be three or more doses of an intermittent anti-malaria preventive treatment, rather than the usual two, significantly reduces their risk of the disease. But researchers at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine have discovered another benefit – to the babies, whose birth weights are increased.
According to UNICEF, an estimated 15 per cent of babies are born weighing fewer than 2.5 kilograms. The actual percentage may be considerably higher, given that up to half of all infants are not weighed at birth, and those who are may be healthier because they and their mothers are under supervision of healthcare professionals.
