Well, this week, we are to talk about statistics that pertain to our project. This should be an easy blog. Since malaria is a disease, it should be well researched. And since people don’t know a lot about the disease, this blog will be full of interesting and vital information for your mind. For anyone who is wondering, locating information regarding malaria on the Internet is actually quite easy—all you have to do is execute a google search. It is just that most people do not normally look up malaria, as it is not a really serious problem in the United States. That is because in the 1950s, the malaria eradication program was implemented and successfully completed in the U.S. However, for some strange reason, this wonderful program was not even started in the sub-Saharan regions of Africa, where malaria is the most rampant. Tres interessant. Was there some prejudiced on the part of administrators of the CDC towards Africa? Or did they think the various affected sub-Saharan African countries were too politically unstable to implement their plan? The lack of action in Africa is highly suspicious. But, I have no evidence yet to back up any of my suspicions.
So, here goes, ladies and gentlemen. All of the information I am citing here can be found online at the Center for Disease Control website. Malaria is a well-researched disease, and people have been studying it for over four thousand years. In ancient China, around 2700 B.C., the symptoms of malaria were described in the Nei Ching, (Canon of Medicine). Malaria was also recognized in Greece in the 4th century, BCE, and it was the reason for the decline of many Mediterranean city populations. The Chinese found that the Qinghao plant (Artemisia annua) was a remedy for malaria in the 2nd century B.C.E. The active ingredient in Qinghao is now known as artemisinin, and it was isolated in 1971 by Chinese scientists. Artemisinin is a very effective anti-malarial drug, and is still used today. In the early 17th century A.D., Jesuit missionaries in South America discovered that bark from a certain tree they named Cinchona was effective in treating fevers caused by malaria. Today, the active ingredient in the bark, quinine, is used as an effective drug against malaria. Various scientists of the 19th century were involved in discovering that malaria was caused by a parasite from the genus Plasmodia. Scientists also discovered that the parasite’s life cycle involved living part of its life in a mosquito, and then living the rest of its life in a host. With this knowledge, people in industrialized nations with temperate climates were somewhat able to control the spread of malaria by using insecticides to prevent the transmission of the disease and drugs to treat malaria.
Malaria is a very serious disease that affects nearly three hundred million to five hundred million people worldwide per year, and kills nearly one million people a year. Every year, about one thousand two hundred people in the United States contract malaria; most of these people are travelers who have visited areas of the world, such as sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian sub-continent, where malaria is a common problem. Malaria is concentrated in areas of the world that are around the equator. It is prevalent in over 100 countries and about 41% of the world’s population is at risk of getting this disease. The disease is most common in some parts of Central and South America, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Africa, the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and various islands in the Pacific. The constantly warm and humid temperatures of the aforementioned places provide for an optimum environment for mosquitoes to breed and continue the malaria causing parasite’s life cycle.
Children who live in areas with high infection rates are at the highest risk for contracting malaria because kids have not built up immunity to the disease. Pregnant women also are at an increased risk of catching malaria in high risk areas because, during pregnancy, immunity to malaria is decreased. Lastly, travelers from areas of low infection rates of malaria to areas of high rates of malaria infection are at risk of catching the disease because they have not built up immunity to the disease. However, travelers who catch malaria usually are treated. Children from third-world countries however, often die from the disease. According to the Center for Disease Control, malaria killed 1,098,000 children in the year 2003. Most of the children who die of this disease are from the sub-Saharan regions of Africa, where about 90% of the deaths from malaria occur.
The symptoms of malaria are much like the symptoms of the flu to the untrained eye. The plasmodium that causes malaria goes through a dormant or incubation period where it multiplies and sits in the patient’s body. Then, it becomes active and begins to attack blood cells as it proliferates throughout the body. During this phase, the patient may experience bouts of chills, fever, nausea, sweating and vomiting. Severe malaria can occur if a person’s malaria infection is complicated by organ failure or blood abnormalities. Complications can include cerebral malaria, which features abnormal behavior, coma, seizures, and other neurological abnormalities, severe anemia due to destruction of blood cells, fluid in the lungs, and cardiovascular collapse and shock. Pregnant women are who contract malaria are at a high risk for delivering low birth weight babies.
Despite malaria’s reputation around the world as a horrible disease, it is easy to diagnose and cure if given the correct treatment. There are a multitude of effective drugs on the market for the treatment of malaria. These drugs include quinine, chloroquine, and artemisin derivatives. These drugs should be administered within twenty-four hours of the symptoms of malaria being noticed. These drugs, in combination with pesticide control, are effective in reducing the suffering caused by malaria. All that is needed is a structured and reliable worldwide system for the drugs and pest control services to get to the people who need them.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 28th, 2005 at 10:24 pm and is filed under Project Progress, Week 07: Research Stats. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.