Brazil’s health ministry on Monday said 115,708 malaria cases had been reported in the first half of this year in the Brazilian Amazon, down 31 percent compared with the same period in 2010, the Latin American Herald Tribune reports. “‘The positive figures are the result of comprehensive action, which includes stepping up the routines for early diagnosis and the opportune treatment of patients,’ Health Minister Alexandre Padilha said,” the newspaper writes.

The ministry launched a campaign on Monday to distribute 1.1 million insecticide-treated bed nets with the objective of “clos[ing] the year with less than 300,000 cases of malaria, a ‘daring’ goal since most of the infections occur in the month of August, Padilha told the official Agencia Brasil news agency,” according to the newspaper (9/6).