Mother’s Socioeconomic Status and Under-Five Malaria Infection in Nasarawa State

The main objective of this paper is to contribute to understanding the relationship between a mother’s socioeconomic status and child malaria infection in Nasarawa State. This is because Nasarawa State is one of the states with the highest malaria cases in Nigeria, and previous finding from other malaria endemic areas shows different factors influencing child malaria. This study aimed to research the regional determining factors in Nasarawa State, seeing that less of this study is undertaken in the state. During the survey, a multi-stage sampling technique was used to collect data from 477 women with children between 0 and 5. Binary logistic regression was used to analyse this relationship. The results from binary logistic regression without control variables indicated a negative relationship between the mother’s socioeconomic status and child malaria infection. Including necessary control variables in the binary logistic regression shows that the mother’s level of education is the only mother’s socioeconomic variable that is a consistent determinant of child malaria infection in Nasarawa State. Lafia and Keffi were the best-performing communities in the state for children with malaria-free infection. At the same time, Agyaragu had the highest number of malaria-infected children. The study recommends that Government and community leaders encourage girl child education, especially among rural dwellers of Nasarawa State, through a sensitisation campaign.