“Malaria made me and my family poor,” says Ngoy Kabulo, 52, of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. “Every day, we would wake up with swollen bodies because of mosquito bites,” he says. “Our two small children had anemia every month, and we were always spending money on the hospital.”

But a very simple item — a long-lasting insecticide-treated bed net — can help put a stop to this escalation. When coupled with malaria-fighting, awareness-raising efforts, it can reverse the trend and even end the threat posed by this totally preventable disease to families like Kabulo’s.

Read more via The Huffington Post.