Children living in redesigned rural homes in Tanzania were found to have fewer bouts of sickness than those in traditional huts

Lilia Sebouai

Global Health Security Reporter

Lilia Sebouai is a reporter for The Telegraph’s Global Health Security and Foreign desks. She covers topics including infectious disease, emerging threats, humanitarian crises and conflict.

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Published 30 April 2026 6:00am BST

Architecture may hold the secret to slashing malaria rates in children by nearly half, researchers have found.

In a study published in the journal Nature, researchers redesigned rural homes in Tanzania to try and block the transmission routes of three deadly childhood illnesses: malaria, diarrhoea and respiratory infections.

They found children living in the new houses, known as ‘Star Homes’, had fewer bouts of sickness than those in traditional mud-walled, thatched-roof huts.…