Twenty years ago, the invention of the long-lasting insecticide-treated mosquito net sparked a global scale-up that has cut malaria deaths by half and saved more than 14 million lives.
But we need new tools to end the crisis of mosquito-borne disease.
What if the next “bed net” isn’t a bed net at all?
The cost of universal bed net coverage is unsustainable in the age of declining aid dollars, and existing tools are becoming less effective due to insecticide resistance, lax usage and more daytime biting from mosquitoes.
The good news: After more than ten years of investment, R&D and testing, SC Johnson has developed a solution that is field-ready, WHO-approved and affordable. It’s a “spatial repellent” called Guardian™.
Guardian™ is a lightweight, rapid, last-mile tool. A thin mesh panel smaller than a sheet of paper, Guardian™ hangs on a wall and repels indoor mosquitoes, protecting people from malaria and other diseases.
Guardian™ provides continuous 12-month, 24/7 coverage for an indoor space up to 15 cubic meters. It can cover multiple beds in a home and is ideal for informal settings like refugee camps.
Guardian™ has shown an additional 32% protection against malaria when used with nets, and ~83% protection against biting as a standalone tool. But the biggest transformation could be for diseases with day-time biting mosquitoes — like dengue, yellow fever and zika — where nets cannot provide protection.
In August 2025, the World Health Organization pre-qualified Guardian™ and issued a policy recommendation supporting spatial repellents as the first new class of vector control tools in 25 years.
BillionScale Health worked with SC Johnson to identify innovations and pricing commitments that could cut the cost of protection with Guardian by as much as 85% over 4 years:
Taken together, these innovations could make spatial repellents far cheaper than nets for comparable protection. This is welcome news for countries and donors that are looking for innovations that bend the curve both on disease burden and affordability.
We need new tools in the fight against malaria, and Guardian™ couldn’t have come at a better time.
Now, let’s take it to scale.
