East Setauket – Bayport resident Erin West saw firsthand the devastating effects of malaria during time spent this summer in Ghana. Now, teaming up with an elementary school in East Setauket and her stepfather, Suffolk County Executive Steven Levy, she is launching a fundraising effort to provide mosquito bed netting to malaria-impacted communities.

The Minnesauke Elementary School Community Service Project is launching a school wide ‘change drive’ to raise money for organizations which provide Insecticide Treated Bed Nets, a highly effective means of protecting young children from mosquito bites while they sleep.

They hope to establish similar fund-raising efforts in other elementary schools as they bring this campaign around the county.

“Every 30 seconds, a child in Africa dies from malaria, and more than 90 percent of people infected with malaria live in sub-Saharan Africa,” West said. “Illness and death from malaria is largely preventable, but a very small percentage of young children in Ghana sleep under a bed net.”

The World Health Organization has suggested that the lives of some 500,000 young African children could be saved every year from malaria if insecticide-treated bed nets were widely used.