Nearby, under the muggy shade of a blue tarpaulin, Dr Justyne Barbara has also had a busy morning. A medical specialist within the Philippines Health Office, she’s checked 15 pregnant women and treated 64 children for malnutrition.
“Before, people here would run away if they saw a healthcare worker,” she says. “But after years of outreach and the leadership of community elders, that’s changed – now they see us and run to us.
“A lot of that started with the malaria programme. But it’s important to integrate malaria into other programmes – nutrition, maternal and neonatal health, vaccinations… to make the most of every trip up the mountain,” Dr Barbara adds.
Yet as well as travelling to affected areas, the malaria programme has also encouraged communities to come to them. One trial in 2018 even saw the construction of a new village, complete with a basic healthcare station, for indigenous groups who wanted to move further down the mountain.
“It’s more than a malaria health problem, it’s a malaria and development problem,” says Dr Antonio Bautista, a malaria programme manager for the Pilipinas Shell Foundation, adding that cases are generally found in the poorest neighbourhoods.
“But there’s really no manual that tells you what to do, when to tone things down. If it was up to me, we would keep doing everything until we get to zero,” he says. “As far back as 2014, every time we reach a new low, it’s followed by an upsurge. But we haven’t exceeded 6,400… the problem now is how to get 6,400 down to 4,000, to 3,000, to zero.”
Yet the Movement Against Malaria has another weapon up their sleeve. There are no plans to roll out vaccinations here – partly because the Philippines has a track record of scepticism, but mostly because available shots are more geared towards preventing fatalities than halting transmission.