Malaria Is The Leading Cause Of Death From Parasitic Infection Worldwide

Malaria (also called biduoterian fever, blackwater fever, falciparum malaria, plasmodium, Quartan malaria, and tertian malaria) is one of the most infectious and most common diseases in the world. This serious, sometimes-fatal disease is caused by a parasite that is carried by a certain species of mosquito called the Anopheles. It claims more lives every year than any other transmissible disease except tuberculosis. Every year, five hundred million adults and children (around nine percent of the world’s population) contract the disease and of these, one hundred million people die. Children are more susceptible to the disease than adults, and in Africa, where ninety percent of the world’s cases occur and where eighty percent of the cases

Malaria is one of the most significant infectious disease burdens worldwide. The disease especially targets the most vulnerable groups, namely infants and children, and accounts for approximately 20% of childhood deaths in Africa. Many people living in countries where malaria is endemic are unable to afford, or do not have access to, medications needed for treatment, which contributes to high morbidity and mortality. Furthermore, malaria has a devastating economic impact, with gross domestic products decreasing up to 1.3% in highly affected countries. The World Health Organization concluded through their research that malaria is the fifth biggest killer in sub-Saharan Africa.

Malaria is regarded as one of the world's deadliest tropical parasitic diseases. It claims more lives than any other communicable disease except tuberculosis. In Africa and other developing countries, it also accounts for millions of dollars in medical costs. Malaria, however, is a curable disease if promptly diagnosed and adequately treated.

Malaria has been a huge problem among many developing nations over the past century. The amount of people in the entire world that die from malaria each year is between 700,000 and 2.7 million. 75% of these deaths are African children (Med. Letter on CDC & FDA, 2001). 90% of the malaria cases in the world are located in Sub-Saharan Africa. Once again, the majority of these deaths are of children (Randerson, 2002). The numbers speak for themselves. Malaria is a huge problem and needs to be dealt with immediately.

Malaria or other similar diseases like malaria has been recognized and encountered by humans for more than 4,000 years. Malaria is caused by the genus Plasmodium parasites, which enter the human body and are transmitted to people through the bite of a mosquito infected with the parasite (Q&A, Malaria). Once the parasite enters the human body, the parasites multiply in the liver and then infect red blood cells. The malaria parasite was first discovered on November 6, 1880, by a French army surgeon named Charles Louis Al phonse Laveran. While stationed in

According to the Malaria Vaccine Institute, almost 600 million people suffer from malaria each year, and more than one million people die from this disease every year, the most deaths come from children younger than five. Malaria is endemic to over 100 countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, and the South Pacific, around 40% of the world population. Malaria is caused by a parasite that is transferred by the bite of an infected female Anopheles mosquito. The most deadly form of malaria is known as Plasmodium falciparum because almost all deaths from malaria are caused by this specific one. In addition to being the deadliest form of malaria, Plasmodium falciparum destroys red blood cells along with causing complications with the kidneys, lungs, and brain. In more serious cases, it can cause permanent neurological effects and even death. As the Nobel Assembly said at the announcement of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, “Diseases caused by parasites have plagued humankind for a millennium and constitute a major global health problem. In particular, parasitic diseases affect the world’s poorest populations and represent a huge barrier to improving human health and wellbeing”. Youyou Tu, one of the winners of the prize, discovered Artemisinin, a drug that has significantly reduced the mortality rates for patients suffering from malaria by killing the malaria parasites an early stage of their development.

Malaria has been spread by various factors, from contaminated blood transfusion to mosquitos, being the leading carrier of malaria. It can have damaging effect on the human body, and with it constantly changing, the malaria protozoa becomes harder for doctors to treat. Malaria, causing as 1.2 million deaths in 2011, has had a global impact “(Mcneil 1). It is still heavily impacts people in many tropical areas (“Disease” 202). New natural remedies have been tested to attempt to combat malaria (Avasthi 1).Malaria can have a deadly impact on all types of people, including pregnant women (Gomes 1). The malaria parasite is changing to resist treatments, and doctors are researching how to defeat it (Avasthi 1). Malaria is from genus plasmodium, which

After infection malaria can sit dormant for up to a month while other species of the parasite will will cause a shorter period of dormancy, typically lasting from a couple of days to seven days. After the dormant or incubation periods have finished is when the disease starts its symptoms. Diagnosis is confirmed usually by manual microscope blood sample analysis. While there are a number of different kinds of anti-malarials, one kind, called “chloroquine” is mainly used. If treated urgently and correctly, the prognosis of malaria is very good for most of the plasmodium types. P. falciparum can be a bit of a problem, but is also usually not fatal. The reason malaria is so fatal is because people who contract, especially in the third world, do not always have a means to seek medical care.

Malaria is an infectious disease caused by parasitic protozoans which belong to the plasmodium type. It is commonly transmitted by female Anopheles mosquito. The mosquito bite transfers the bacteria into the bloodstream. The parasite migrates to the liver and reproduce. (Slutsker & Kachur, 2013).

Plasmodium falciparium belongs to the family Plasmodidae and is one of four different Plasmodium species that infect humans (7). Plasmodium species are obligate intracellular parasitic protozoa that are unicellular, eukaryotic and chemoheterotrophic and as a result, need a host for nutrition and reproduction (5). Plasmodium falciparium along with Plasmodium malariae, Plasmodium ovale and Plasmodium vivax are usually seen as human parasites (10). P. falciparium is one of the two protozoan parasites that is responsible for most cases of malaria, the other being Plasmodium vivax (6). P. falciparium is usually found in the tropics and subtropics but has also spread to temperate zones (11). Blood smears are usually used to differentiate between the four species because at the blood stage, they tend to modify the host erythrocyte differently and exhibit differences in their morphology (6, 7). P. falciparium is usually characterized with young rings in the absence of mature rings and schizonts (9). These ring stages tend to be slightly smaller and more numerous than those of the other species. Other distinguishable characteristics of P. falciparum are its high level of parasitemia and its banana shaped gametocytes (7). The genome size of P. falciparum ranges between 1x107 and 4x108 base pairs and its cell cycle takes place in two stages: asexual and sexual (10).

Malaria is one of the most popular infectious diseases and a major public health problem worldwide. Billions of people are at risk of infection in 109 countries. Annually, there are an estimated 250 million cases of malaria leading to about one million deaths. Malaria is a disease that is caused by parasites in the red blood cells of a human body, and is usually transmitted by the bite of certain species of mosquitos.

About 3.3 billion people, that is about half of the world’s population are at risk of contracting malaria (figure 1). Every year there are 250 million cases of malaria, and nearly 1 million deaths. That amounts to 2,732 deaths per day. Out of those million people that die every year, 800,000 of them are African children under the age of 5. To control malaria three actions need to be taken: insecticides need to be used to decrease the vector population, people have to be educated as to how to prevent the vector from reproducing, and anti-malarial drugs need to be distributed. To understand the vector and what the vector is, scientists had to first discover what the parasite was and how it worked. It was not until the year 1880 that French Physician Charles Laveran discovered that Malaria was caused by a protozoan in the genus Plasmodium (Malaria, 2013)

Malaria is caused by the bite of an anopheles gambiae mosquito with a plasmodium parasite inside. There are four different protozoa, all part of the plasmodium genus, that can cause malaria: Plasmodium vivax, Plasmodium ovale, Plasmodium malaria, and Plasmodium falciparum. In Nigeria 98% of cases of malaria are due to the P. falciparum species, which causes the most severe form of malaria resulting in death (3). Nigeria is affected by malaria severely due to its climate, 70-90 degrees Fahrenheit and at least 60 percent humidity. As the temperature increases the parasite within the mosquito grows increasingly faster. Another factor that is responsible for the severity of malaria in Nigeria is the rainfall which leads to pools of standing water which in turn become breeding areas for mosquitoes

Cases of malaria are found all over the world, but especially in tropical regions. This disease is very widespread because people obtain malaria when visiting these areas and then they bring it back to where they live. Malaria affects millions of people every year, and depending on the case it can be very serious or easily treated. At the moment there is only one main method that doctors use to treat malaria, but there are many precautions that can be taken to prevent it from infecting someone.

Plasmodium species (sp.) is the caustic protozoan parasite known to cause malarial disease. One of the most common disease in tropical and subtropical regions of the world is malaria, causing 500 million malarial infections with 1-2 million deaths per year (Tangpukdee, Duangdee, Wilairatana, & Krudsood, 2009, p. 93). In addition to the severity of the disease is dependent on the species of Plasmodium acquired by the patient with P. falciparum being the most severe and fatal while P. vivax, P. ovale, P. malariae and P. knowesi cause acute disease that is rarely fatal. Furthermore, the number of malarial cases seems to be increasing due to drug resistant strains that are emerging, increased amount of travel and migration through