Discovery of Malaria

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QUESTION

Who was the discoverer of malaria?

ANSWER

Malaria has been known to humans since ancient times, though what exactly caused it and how it was transmitted was not known. The parasite which causes malaria, from the genus Plasmodium, was first observed in the blood of a patient who had died from the disease by Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran, a French physician working in Algeria. This was in 1880; a few years later, in 1897-1898, a British army doctor called Ronald Ross showed that malaria could be transmitted via the bite of a mosquito. Both doctors eventually received the Nobel Prize for their discoveries.

Malaria Origins

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QUESTION

What is the origin of malaria?

ANSWER

Malaria is caused by a single-celled parasite of the genus Plasmodium. There are five difference species of Plasmodium which infect humans – these all likely evolved from various different species of Plasmodium which infect other primates, such as gorillas (for P. falciparum) and macaques (P. vivax, P. knowlesi, possibly other types as well). This happened many thousands of years ago; humans have been plagued by malaria since before records began. In fact, the first recorded mention of the symptoms of malaria come from ancient China, in a manuscript dated to 2700 years before the common era, or almost 5000 years ago.

However, understanding that malaria was caused by a microscopic parasite, which is transmitted by mosquitoes, occurred much more recently; the Plasmodium parasite was first observed in the blood of a person who died from malaria in 1880 by the French physician Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran. A few years later, in 1897/1898, a British physician, Ronald Ross, demonstrated that the parasite could be transmitted between hosts via the bite of an infected mosquito. Both physicians eventually won Nobel Prizes for their work.

Discovery of Malaria

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QUESTION

How was malaria discovered?

ANSWER

Malaria has long been known to human populations from across the world. In fact, the first mention of the symptoms of malaria comes from an ancient Chinese manuscript from 2700 BCE! However, the actual cause and mechanism of transmission of the disease was only discovered in the 19th century.

It was Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran, a French physician working in Algeria, who first observed the parasites that cause malaria in 1880, by looking at the blood of a patient that had recently died of malaria. However, at this point, it still wasn’t understood how malaria was transmitted. That was not discovered until 1897, when Ronald Ross, a British physician dedicated to curing malaria, observed malaria parasites in a mosquito that had been experimentally fed the blood of a patient infected with malaria. Working in India, Ross also later showed that mosquitoes could also transmit malaria to birds, if they had previously fed on the blood of birds which had malaria. In this way, he showed that mosquitoes of the genus Anopheles are responsible for transmitting malaria between hosts.

First Malaria Outbreak

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QUESTION

When was the first ever outbreak of malaria?

ANSWER

Malaria has actually been known in human populations for thousands of years, so the first ever outbreak occurred long before any records were kept. The ancient Chinese recorded the symptoms of malaria in a medical manuscript which dates back to 2700 BCE, so almost 5000 years ago!

The symptoms of malaria were also known to the ancient Romans, Greeks, Egyptians and native peoples of the Americas, though none of them fully understood the cause of the disease or how it was transmitted. That information was discovered in the late 19th century, by Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran, who first observed malaria parasites in the blood of a patient and attributed them to the disease, and by Ronald Ross, who demonstrated that the malaria parasite was transmitted by mosquitoes.

What year was the cause of malaria discovered?

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QUESTION

When did they find out that a bug bite caused malaria, and what year was that?

ANSWER

In 1880, Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran observed that malaria was caused by a parasite in the blood; it wasn’t until 1897-1898 that Ronald Ross, a British Army medical doctor, discovered that the parasite could be transmitted between hosts (he used birds for his experiments) by mosquitoes.

Malaria and Nkadu Luo

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QUESTION

When did professor Nkadu Luo discover that female mosquito causes malaria?

ANSWER

Professor Nkadu Luo is a microbiologist and immunologist in Zambia. Most of her work has been on HIV/AIDS and sickle cell anaemia. She has also been a key figure in promoting screening of blood banks in Zambia for infectious diseases such as HIV and malaria. However, the discovery that female mosquitoes transmit malaria was made much earlier—taxonomists as early as the mid-19th century were aware of differences in the mouthparts between male and female mosquitoes of certain species, which allowed them to determine that they were feeding on different things (female mosquitoes who feed on blood have very specialised mouthparts, for example).

Then, in the late 1890s, a British doctor called Ronald Ross discovered that mosquitoes transmit malaria parasites when they feed on blood. Prof Luo probably learned about the cycle of malaria transmission during her extensive biomedical training.

First Cases of Malaria

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QUESTION

When was malaria first detected?

ANSWER

Humans have known about malaria as a disease for thousands of years. The earliest written record of malaria is from ancient China, 2700 BCE. The ancient Romans and Greeks also described the symptoms of malaria, though none of these ancient people knew the true cause or had identified specifically how it was transmitted. This was first achieved in the 19th century, first in 1880 by Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran, who observed the parasites that cause malaria in the blood of a patient. A few years later, in 1897/1898, Ronald Ross discovered that the parasites were transmitted between hosts via mosquitoes, thus laying the foundations for future decades of malaria control efforts.

Who Discovered Malaria?

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QUESTION

Who discovered malaria?

ANSWER

People have known about malaria for thousands of years—the first record of it comes from 2700 BCE, in an ancient Chinese medical text. Other ancient peoples, such as the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, also knew the symptoms associated with malaria. But it wasn’t until the 19th century that the causes of malaria were understood. In 1880, a French physician named Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran first saw the parasites that cause malaria in the blood of a patient. By 1886, Camillo Golgi, an Italian physiologist, had observed that there were at least two separate types of malaria, which produced different length cycles of fever during the clinical presentation. These two forms were later called Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium malariae. It wasn’t until more than a decade later, in 1897/1898, that the method of transmission of malaria was first understood – Ronald Ross, a British army doctor, showed that malaria could be passed from a human patient to a mosquito vector, and also between infected hosts using mosquitoes. He won the Nobel Prize for medicine for his work in 1902.

Since then, research on malaria has expanded exponentially, with particular attention giving to understanding ways in which the parasite can be therapeutically halted, thus leading to the discovery of new malaria medications.

How did it get the name “malaria”?

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QUESTION

How did malaria get its name?

ANSWER

The word “malaria” comes from Italian, “mala aria” which literally translates to “bad air”. This came from the ancient association, traced back as far as the ancient Greeks and Romans, that the disease was associated with swampy, marshy areas where the air smelled bad.

The mechanism of transmission was not known back then, nor did they know anything about infectious disease agents like bacteria, viruses or the single-celled protozoa like what causes malaria. So they believed it was the air itself that caused the infection, hence giving malaria its name. The protozoan which causes malaria was not discovered until 1880 when Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran observed the parasites in a patient; it was a few years later, in 1897/1898, that Ronald Ross discovered that mosquitoes transmitted malaria between human hosts. He won a Nobel Prize for this discovery in 1902.

History of Fighting Malaria

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QUESTION

What are some examples of attempts of fighting this disease that happened in the past?

ANSWER

The battle against malaria has been going on, in one form or another, for literally thousands of years. The ancient Chinese mention the symptoms of the disease in a medical scroll as early as 2700 BCE – even more remarkably, a herb called Artemesia has been used in traditional Chinese medicine for more than 2000 years to treat malaria, and compounds extracted from that same herb are the basis for some of the most effective modern medications, known as artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs). Indigenous tribes in the Americas also had traditional medicines to treat malaria; having conquered the New World, the Spanish learned of a bark, from the Cinchona tree, which could cure malaria. Quinine, extracted from this same tree bark, is still used today to treat malaria.

However, back then the causes of malaria were not known—it wasn’t until the late 19th century that a more complete understanding of malaria would emerge. The first key development in this process was the observation of the parasites that cause malaria in a patient’s blood, which was first done by Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran in 1880.

A few years later, in 1897, a British army doctor called Ronald Ross discovered that the parasite was transmitted via the bite of infected mosquitoes, of the genus Anopheles. This latter finding allowed for the emergence of the first programmes for malaria control, which focused on vector control, through insecticide use and elimination of water bodies used by the mosquito larvae. An early example of the success of this approach came in the building of the Panama Canal; started in 1906, progress was initially slow, due to the enormous proportion of workers who fell ill from yellow fever and malaria. With vector control, the number of cases plummeted, and the canal was finally opened in 1914.

While prophylactic quinine had also been part of the control strategy during the building of the Panama Canal, it played a much more secondary role to vector control. Using similar strategies, focusing primarily on killing adult mosquitoes through insecticide spraying (mainly DDT), the United States of America successfully eliminated malaria from its shores in the early 1950s. Prior to this, transmission had occurred across most of the south-east of the country.

In the last 50 years, access to early diagnosis and effective treatment have gained a more prominent role among many malaria control strategies, although prevention is still seen as crucial. Many developing countries, where malaria is still rife, have set up national control programmes, which seek to ensure that all communities have access to adequate care and information about malaria prevention.

A key tool in the prevention arsenal has been the long-lasting insecticide treated bednet; sleeping underneath one prevents bites from the mosquitoes that carry malaria, which are most active in the evenings and at night, especially in children and pregnant women, who are among the people most at risk from infection. Bednet distribution has been a major focus of many malaria campaigns, and very successful in many places; in 2008, for example, bednet coverage was estimated at over 80% of the at-risk population in Djibouti, Mali, Ethiopia and Sao Tome and Principe.