by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
How can malaria affect somebody if you far from mosquitoes?
ANSWER:
It is extremely unlikely for you to become infected with malaria unless you are bitten by an infected mosquito. In rare caces, there have been reports of people contracting malaria through blood transfusions, but in most places, blood donors with a history of malaria are not allowed to donate whole blood, and only plasma, thus preventing transmission through this route.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
What is malaria?
ANSWER:
Malaria is a disease caused by a parasitic single-celled animal known as Plasmodium. There are different species of Plasmodium, which cause different kinds of malaria. The main types which infect humans are P. falciparum, P. vivax, P. ovale and P. malariae. The parasite is transmitted by certain species of mosquito; the parasite lives in the human blood stream and so goes in to the mosquito when the insect feeds. When the same individual mosquito then feeds on another person, it transmits parasites into a new host.
The symptoms of malaria are caused by the actions that the parasite undertakes while in the human host. For example, part of its reproductive cycle involves invading and then multiplying inside red blood cells. Once several cycles of reproduction have occurred, the new parasites burst out of the red blood cell, destroying it. The cycles are times so that all the new parasites burst out of the red blood cells at the same time; this coordinated destruction of the red blood cells, either every 24, 48 or 72 hours, depending on the malaria species, causes the one day, two day or three day cycles of fevers and chills that characterize malaria infection episodes.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
Is there malaria on Bougainville Island?
ANSWER:
Yes, Bougainville Island (an autonomous region of Papua New Guinea) is considered a malaria transmission zone, and precautions against malaria are advised when visiting. These include sleeping under an insecticide treated bednet, wearing long-sleeved clothing and insect repellent in the evenings and talking with your doctor about potentially also taking anti-malaria medication (called prophylaxis) as a further step to prevent infection.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
List four areas in South Africa that are considered high risk for malaria.
ANSWER:
The far north east of the country is the only region considered a high transmission zone for malaria. This includes places such as the Maputoland coast in KwaZulu-Natal, Kruger National Park (and Nelspruit), most of the border region with Swaziland and the lowveld of Mpumalanga. Regions buffering this zone, such as Polokwane, are low to intermediate risk zones; the rest of South Africa is considered malaria-free.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
If someone had malaria but they don’t have it any more can they give it to someone else?
ANSWER:
Regardless of whether a person is still infected with malaria or not, malaria can almost never be transmitted directly from one person to another.
Normally, malaria is only transmitted via infected mosquitoes; so, a mosquito has to bite an infected person, and then bite another person, and the malaria parasites are transmitted via the mosquito’s saliva to the second person. The exception to this is blood transfusions; in area where blood is not thoroughly screened, there have been cases of a person becoming infected with malaria after having received blood from a person with a malaria infection.
Secondly, although the actual disease cannot be transmitted this way, pregnant women who are infected with malaria can pass antigens and antibodies to their unborn child via the placenta, which can cause problems to the baby. For this reason, and others, preventing malaria in pregnant women is a huge priority in global malaria prevention.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
Can breast milk transfer malaria parasites from a mother to the child?
ANSWER:
No. Malaria parasites cannot be transferred via breast milk. However, there is evidence that some antimalarial drugs can pass through breast milk, with unknown effects on the infant; as such, it is not recommended that breast feeding mothers take certain antimalarial drugs.
Studies in rats have also shown that antibodies to malaria can pass from a mother to her infant via breast milk although it is unclear what level of protection this confers on the infant; children under five are generally much more susceptible to malaria infection than older children and adults, due to their lower levels of acquired immunity, and so young children should be protected from exposure as much as possible, for example by having them sleep under long-lasting insecticide treated bednets when in high-transmission zones for malaria.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
How can the mosquito cause malaria?
ANSWER:
Actually, mosquitoes don’t cause malaria themselves, they just transmit it from one person to another! The disease is actually caused by a tiny parasite, of the genus Plasmodium, several species of which infect humans. Part of the parasite’s life cycle takes place in the human host, and the other part in the mosquito; it needs to go through both to survive. Mosquitoes become infected when they feed on the blood of a human host that is infected; the parasites are then transmitted to a new, uninfected human hosts in the mosquitoes saliva, when they again take a blood meal.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
What is malaria?
ANSWER:
Malaria is a disease caused by parasites of the genus Plasmodium. Transmitted by mosquitoes, there are several different kinds of malaria distributed throughout the tropical and sub-tropical regions of the world, causing somewhere between 300-500 million cases of disease each year, and as many as 1 million deaths. In fact, malaria is one of the biggest killers of children under the age of five in sub-Saharan Africa, one of the regions of the world where the burden from malaria is the highest. Malaria is usually an acute disease, manifesting itself with severe fever, chills, headache and often nausea as well. Some types of malaria can have relapsing episodes over a time period of many years.
Having said this, malaria is easily preventable, through avoiding mosquito bites by wearing appropriate clothing and sleeping under insecticide-treated bednets, or through taking preventative medication (called prophylaxis). Malaria is also treatable once symptoms appear, through ingesting safe, effective and relatively cheap drugs. With such control measures at hand, you may ask why malaria is still such a huge problem in our world; the answer is that delivering control strategies and treatment to populations most at risk is difficult, and often countries with high malaria burdens don’t have efficient and effective health systems in place to coordinate control efforts.
International non-governmental organisations such as the World Health Organisation, as well as a multitude of non-profit organisations such as the Malaria Consortium and Malaria No More, work tirelessly to bring malaria control and treatment to the places that need it most, with the aim to eradicate malaria as a disease of public health importance.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
Is malaria contagious?
ANSWER:
No, malaria isn’t directly contagious from one person to another. It has to be transmitted by the bite of a mosquito, which means that if someone near you has malaria, those mosquitoes that bite him are carrying the disease! So, the best way to avoid getting infected is to make sure neither you nor your brother are bitten by mosquitoes. The best way to prevent biting is by wearing long sleeved shirts and long trousers, especially during dusk, dawn and at night, when mosquitoes are most active. Similarly, you should try to sleep under an insecticide-treated bednet. These have been proven to reduce biting from mosquitoes, and therefore the transmission of malaria.
by Malaria Q&A
QUESTION:
Is malaria caused by the absence of one of the following in diet: bacteria, virus, fungi, protozoa?
ANSWER:
If I understand your question correctly, you are asking if malaria is caused by the absence of a particular organism from a person’s diet—in fact, malaria is caused by a protozoan, but infection is not linked to a person’s diet. Instead, people are infected with the protozoans (small, single-celled organisms—in the case of malaria, they belong to the genus Plasmodium) when a mosquito feeds on the person’s blood. The malaria parasites are present in the mosquito’s saliva gland, and enter the human bloodstream as the mosquito is drinking. When a mosquito feeds on a person already infected with malaria, it picks up malaria parasites in the blood it takes in. This is how malaria is transmitted, in the vast majority of cases.