Malaria

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Malaria is a tropical disease spread by the mosquito. It is caused by a protozoan of the Sporozoa group. There are four species of protozoan that cause malaria, the most common of which is Plasmodium vivax. All malaria-causing parasites spend part of their life cycle in humans and part of it in the Anopheles mosquito.

Contents

DDT Controversy

One very effective way to fight malaria is by using an insecticide called DDT. [1] Unfortunately for sub-Saharan Africans and some Asians, the U.S. ban on DDT has made this cheap (though teratogenic) chemical[2] very difficult to obtain. This helped lead to a renewed malaria epidemic, and more than one million people die of malaria every year.

There is a controversy over malaria eradication. While most Americans are in favor of relieving third-world people of the scourge of preventable disease, some prominent Westerners oppose anything that would lead to increases in population (see population control).

  • Club of Rome founder Alexander King said, "My chief quarrel with DDT in hindsight is that it greatly added to the population problem."
  • Oceanographer Jacques Cousteau told Novelle Observateur, "In order to stabilize world populations, we must eliminate 350,000 people a day." [1]

Malaria is transmitted by the Anopheles mosquito.

Eradication efforts

Malaria was eradicated from the United States in 1951, and in 1955 the World Health Organization stated that it would eradicate malaria worldwide in an effort similar to the eradication of smallpox that was ongoing at the time. The eradication efforts were partially successful, particularly on the Indian subcontinent, but areas such as sub-Saharan Africa were ignored. This poor organization combined with lack of funding by donor countries and the evolution of mosquitos to become resistant to many insecticides led to an abandonment of the eradication effort. In 2005 the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced that it would be donate $258 million to malaria research to compliment President Bush's Presidential Malaria Initiative of 1.2 billion over 5 years. The goal of these initiative is to achieve the worldwide eradication of malaria, which kills approximately 1 child every 30 seconds, through the use of vaccines, mosquito control, insecticide impregnated bednets, and new anti-malarial drugs.[3] [4]

The deforestation of the Amazon basin may also deliver disease. The culverts along new roads will provide spawning grounds for mosquitoes, and allow visitors to bring malaria to isolated areas.[5]

References

  1. ↑ "Sprayed just once or twice a year on the walls of houses, this powerful repellant keeps most mosquitoes from entering; irritates those that do come in, so they don't bite; and kills any that land." Pro-malaria forces resurface at WHO - Paul Driessen - May 15, 2007 - Accuracy in Media
  2. ↑ Toxicology Network
  3. ↑ http://www.gatesfoundation.org/GlobalHealth/Pri_Diseases/Malaria/Announcements/Announce-071007.htm
  4. ↑ http://www.pmi.org
  5. ↑ New roads in the Amazon may also deliver disease

See also

References

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