Mayotte: Indigenous cases of malaria recorded for the first time in five years

Twelve indigenous cases of malaria have been detected in Mayotte since the beginning of the year, including ten in July, a first in five years, the regional branch of Public Health France (SpF) announced on Tuesday, August 12.

"For the first time since July 2020, twelve cases of locally acquired malaria were recorded in Mayotte: one in February, one in June and ten in July 2025," SpF indicates in its regional epidemiological bulletin.

A total of 66 cases of malaria have been reported in the small French archipelago in the Indian Ocean , with the majority of imported cases coming from the neighboring Comoros. Twenty-six people have been hospitalized and five have been admitted to intensive care. "No deaths have been recorded," SpF said.

"For the past five years, we have only recorded imported cases, mainly from the Comoros but also from Madagascar and continental African countries (...). But the increase in the number of imported cases has encouraged the spread of the disease locally," Youssouf Hassani, the regional delegate of Public Health France, explained to AFP.

"These figures show that there is a risk of the disease being reintroduced. We must especially pay attention to the epidemic outbreak in the Comoros," he added, while refusing to talk about a "resurgence" of the epidemic in Mayotte.

In 2024, 119 imported cases were recorded in Mayotte, compared to 38 in 2023. The incidence of indigenous malaria cases has steadily declined in Mayotte since the early 2000s, from nearly 2,000 reported cases in 2002 to just two in 2020, and then none until this year.

In 2014, the World Health Organization (WHO) classified Mayotte as one of the "territories in the malaria elimination phase".

Malaria was also almost eradicated in the Comoros between 2010 and 2016, but this country, whose nearest island (Anjouan) is only 70 km from Mayotte, has faced a resurgence of the disease in recent years, even if the number of cases remains far from the 103,600 recorded in 2010.