Geographical Information System (GIS) in Decision Support to Control Malaria - A Case Study of Koraput District in Orissa, India

Vector-borne diseases such as malaria cause tremendous public health burden globally. Malaria is endemic in >100 countries and ~40% of the world’s population is at malaria risk. Malaria is a local and focal disease. Besides ecological parameters which influence the disease there are some important local factors such as socioeconomic, socio-cultural and behaviour patterns of the community which play a major role in disease transmission. If these parameters are to be used effectively for decision-making, they must be well organized and managed. This goal can be accomplished by compilation of generated dataset and its integration within spatial infrastructure (SI) and introducing a geographical information system (GIS) for analysis and management. GIS is a set of strategies and tools capable of integrating, storing, editing, analyzing and displaying geographicallyreferenced information from various sources.