The global area for Plasmodium ovale is small as compared with that for other 
species of human malaria pathogens. It has expanded in Asian areas and remained 
as before in the African ones. In the past 20 years, there have been 2129 
malaria cases imported from far abroad to Russia, including 84 (4%) cases of 
vivax malaria (P. ovale). The patients were most foreign citizens: 70 from 20 
African countries and 7 from two countries of Oceania, such as Papua New Guinea 
and Indonesia. The other 7 patients were Russia's people who had returned from 
different countries of Africa. For this period there have been a total of 5 
cases of mixed infection: tropical P. falciparum malaria + vivax P. ovale 
malaria. The mission of detected new sympatric subspecies (P. ovale curtisi and 
P. ovale wallikeri) inhabiting the tropical countries with continuous local 
transmission remains unclear. Only a thorough study of these subspecies will be 
able to effectively apply preventive measures and to carry out their elimination 
in future.