QUESTION

If someone were to eat/ingest the blood of an infected individual would they become infected with malaria? If an infected person’s blood was on their hands and they handled food, would eating the food put others at risk for malaria?

ANSWER

No, you would not get infected with malaria, as the malaria parasites must be transmitted into a person’s blood directly in order for them to be infected. As such, most transmission only occurs via mosquitoes: when a mosquito bites a person infected with malaria, it may pick up some of the malaria parasites while it feeds on the person’s blood. When it then goes to bite another person, after the parasite has replicated and changed inside the mosquito, it can pass the malaria on to the next person, again when it bites them and drinks the person’s blood.

Additionally, in some cases malaria can be transmitted by blood transfusion or organ donation, or from a mother to her unborn baby via the placenta, or through blood passed in childbirth. If you ate/drank malaria-infected blood, the parasites would be broken down and destroyed by your stomach acid.