We are delighted to be able to share that photographer Pearl Gan was awarded the 3rd Prize yesterday in the Care Together category for the Swiss Malaria Group’s #EndMalaria Photo and Video Contest. The winning photograph is shown above.
Pearl Gan has been working with the Eijkman-Oxford Clinical Research Unit in Jakarta, Indonesia on the See Malaria in Asia Project which aims to raise public awareness of malaria as a serious health problem for the region by telling the human story of Asia’s invisible malaria burden.
Most malaria in Asia occurs among the rural poor, who do not yet live among the benefits of the profound economic progress that the region has seen. These populations are often “invisible”, not only in an epidemiological sense but also in social terms. And therefore communities who are engaged with the global malaria problem do not see all those affected by malaria in Asia.
Funded by the Wellcome Trust, this photography project aims to engage the public with exhibitions across Asia. While working on the project, photographer Pearl Gan visited remote communities where endemic malaria causes illness and deaths. EOCRU Director Prof Kevin Baird (Link to his profile) says, “Pearl Gan captures much in her art – humanity, dignity, suffering. Her lens exposes the reality of the isolation and poverty that give malaria such freedom of harm and constraint of human development.”
This photo is currently being exhibited together with the other winners in the Swiss Malaria Group’s photographic exhibition ‘Be the generation to end malaria’ on the lakeside of Geneva.