ASSESSMENT OF MALARIA INCIDENCE ON ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT IN KOGI STATE, NIGERIA

The study assessed the impact of malaria incidence on economic development in Kogi State, Nigeria. Malaria has been a major challenge in Nigeria in general and Kogi State in particular and it has shown itself in the slow pace of human development, morbidity and mortality. The main objective of the study was to investigate the impact of malaria incidence on economic development in Kogi State. The study adopted the descriptive and quantitative methods to examine the impact of malaria incidence on economic development in Kogi state. Kogi State comprises of twenty one local government areas of which seven local government areas were purposively selected for the study. Data collected for the study were both primary and secondary data. The primary data was collected from respondents across seven local government areas of Kogi State. The sample for this study comprised of 400 individuals drawn from the population of 1,330,900 persons that make up the seven LGAs. The local government areas covered in the study were Lokoja, Ajaokuta, Omala, Igalamela-Odolu, Kabba/Bunu, Ibaji and Bassa. A multi-stage sampling method was used for this study. In the first stage, seven LGAs that had rivers around them and also prone to flooding and secondly, the geography, ecology and climate which favours numerous habitats of mosquitoes were selected through judgemental sampling. To this end, the Ordinary Least Square (OLS) regression method was used to determine the relationships between variables. Chi-square statistic was also employed to ascertain the association between incidence of malaria and indices of economic development. Cramer's V method was also utilized to determine the statistical significance and provides information about the strength of the relationship between two categorical variables. The findings showed that while incidence of malaria had negative impact on the per-capita income, human capital development, farmers ’ productivity, and man-hour, it had positive impact on the poverty, and infant mortality in Kogi State. The study recommended that the various methods of treatment utilized by citizens of Kogi State for the combat of malaria should be sustained and government should make efforts to improve them. Besides, there is the need for health awareness campaign through seminars organized by the various Primary Health Care Centres and coordinated by the State Ministry of Health on the dangers of malaria, modes of transmission, various forms of protection against malaria and proper ways of using them. This would help the citizens of Kogi State to continue to use the various methods to reduce malaria incidence in order to increase their per-capita incomes, human capital development, and reduction of poverty.