The Republic Of Hope For Sub Saharan Africa

"About Malaria." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. CDC, n.d. Web. 10 Dec. 2015. .

Malaria has become a common name throughout the world. While significant efforts have been made since antimalarial treatments in the 1940’s, the disease still continues as an endemic around the globe. Malaria is a global public health issue, with epidemiological methods of tracking patterns, causes, and effects of health outcomes to continuously work toward protecting and saving lives. While current interventions have impacted the rates of malaria, advances have been made to include spatial targeting for predicting risk in certain locations, methods of using microbes to eliminate mosquito prevalence, and opportunities for vaccines to reduce incidence rates can be promising practices to reduce the

In poor countries children and pregnant women are the most affected by the disease. Africa is one of the most affected countries in the world. One reason for this is the climate. Another reason is the lack of funding. Two to three billion dollars is needed per year to fund malaria control programs. But around only two hundred million dollars is spent on malaria control by African and UN agencies. Some say that malaria could be the cause of poverty rather than the consequence. Unlike other diseases, malaria is not caused by poor hygiene or unsafe drinking water. The difficulty in controlling malaria is mainly due to climate and ecology. To get rid of malaria completely would require a well run organization and a lot of

Malaria is an infectious disease carried by mosquitos which is endemic to many tropical and subtropical regions, predominantly Northern Africa. Since 1980, data has been systematically collected in an attempt to expose true Global mortality rates; revealing both positive and negative fluctuations. However since

Despite the significant gains made in reducing malaria in Ghana, this disease remains a major public heath

von Seidlein L et al. discusses the changes in malaria incidence recorded at a single site in Africa over 25 years, along with future implications for disease prevention.

Malaria is an ancient disease. The name itself traces its origins to Medieval Italian: “mal aria” or bad air referred to a swampy area of Rome known as the Pontina that saw very high infection rates (Beltz, 2011). To this day, the disease continues to be one of the most important parasitic infections known to man. According to the World Health Organization, 3.4 million people may be considered at risk on a global scale and estimates indicate that there were 207 million cases in 2012 with 627,000 deaths (WHO, 2013). More than 85% of these cases occur on the continent of Africa as well as 90% of the deaths. In highly endemic regions, malaria is more of an issue of morbidity than mortality, although the majority of individuals may be parasitized at any given time only a minority exhibit severe symptoms (Marsh & Snow, 1997). Instead these countries are at a significant economic disadvantage due to ill workers, lack of tourism and company investments, not to mention the educational loss future generations also incur.

Malaria is a preventable disease transmitted by a female anopheles mosquito that has a global annual death impact of over one million mainly concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa (Patricia Schlagenhauf-Lawlor, & Funk-Baumann, M., 2005, pg. 6)(1). Although malaria is almost unheard of in developed countries like the United States, in the early 1900s malaria was just as prevalent as it is in sub-Saharan Africa today. The United States has eradicated local malaria due to increased finances and physician led public health missions in the 1940’s in the form of the DDT campaign(Humphries, 2001, pg. 2). However, in underdeveloped countries mainly located in tropical areas, the death toll to malaria continues to rise due to challenges and barriers between accumulating hefty finances, adequate resources and delivering affective outreach programs( Jennifer Kates, Michaud, J., Wexler, A., Valentine, A., 2013)(3).

In 2015, approximately 3.2 billion people, which is almost half of the world 's population, were at risk of being infected with Malaria. Most cases of malaria occur in sub-Saharan Africa however, Asia, Latin America, and, the Middle East are at risk but to a lesser extent. In 2015, 95 countries had relentless malaria spread, around 88% of the cases and 90% of deaths where in Africa. The pattern between most countries is that they are low or middle income countries. Those who do not have access to proper health care are the ones who are most affected by the disease. Even in sub Saharan Africa the three countries with the highest death from malaria are among the poorest in the region. The high cases and death rates in Africa is caused by different reasons.

Malaria is a life-threatening disease that is caused by plasmodium parasites transmitted from female mosquitos when they bite a human. The plasmodium parasite can also be transmitted by blood products like unclean needles or unscreened blood. There are five parasite species (Plasmodium, falciparum, P. vivax, P. ovale, and P. malariae) that cause malaria in humans, and two of these species, P. falciparum and P. vivax, are the greatest threat (see Figure 1). The severity of malaria is based on the species of plasmodium. The symptoms people experience include chills, fever, and sweating usually occurring within a few weeks after being bitten. In the United States, it is a very rare disease with fewer than 20,000 cases per year, and is treatable by a medical professional. However, Sub-Saharan Africa is home to 88% of malaria cases and 90% of malaria deaths. P. falciparum is the most prevalent parasite on the African continent and is responsible for most malaria-related deaths globally. P. vivax is more widely distributed than P. falciparum and predominates in most countries outside of Africa. In the 1970s and 1980s, resistance of P. falciparum started in medicines, such as chloroquine and sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine (SP). Drug resistance has been implicated in the spread of malaria to new areas and re-emergence of malaria in areas where the disease had been eradicated. Population movement has introduced resistant parasites to areas previously free of drug resistance. Resistance is

Here in America, having the privilege to go to the doctors even when you are not ill is taken for granted. While you’ve been comfortably impatient waiting in a doctors office, have you ever taken the time to think about the millions of people around the world who die merely because they do not have the medicine, the care, and the knowledge to even help themselves prevent these easily preventable diseases and illnesses. Every sixty seconds, malaria claims life of another precious child. Maybe this is news to you or maybe this is your opportunity to let this problem resonate, while taking into account the health issues others around the world face on a daily basis. The prevalence of major diseases, such as malaria, occurring in developing

As of 2013, there were 97 countries with sustained malaria transmission, and 7 countries in prevention of the reintroduction phase, making a total of 104 countries where malaria is presently considered endemic 1,3,10,15,24. It is estimated that 3.4 billion people are at risk of malaria and WHO estimates that 207 million cases of malaria occurred globally with 627,000 deaths in 20121,3,10,15,24. 80% of cases occurred in Africa and most deaths (77%) occurred in children under the age of 5 3,7,10,15,23,24. The burden faced in Sub-Saharan Africa continues to be a challenge for national governments. Increasing resistance to drugs and pesticides, the lack of capacity to implement programs effectively and low public education about malaria are only a few of the many complications that African governments must address to effectively combat malaria 1,3,7,10,15,18,20,23. In order to reduce malaria incidence, some African countries are moving back towards dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT), an insecticide once widely used throughout the world for agricultural and public health purposes1, 3,10,15,16,23.

During the research period for this paper a lot was learned, especially concerning the transmission of malaria and everything that is used to prevent and cure the horrible disease. The most important things that were learned were what exactly malaria does to the human body (the whole process), how exactly malaria is transmitted, why it is so hard to be stopped, and what organizations are trying to solve malaria and what they are doing to help the worldwide problem.

Medical treatment for malaria is available and the disease is curable if promptly diagnosed and treated well. This is crucial because those who have malaria parasites available for mosquitoes to feed on are perpetuating the spread of the disease. However, if these people are treated with the appropriate drugs, the parasites disappear from their bloodstream. This helps to reduce the transmission of the disease. Unfortunately, not everyone is responsive to drug treatments for malaria and thus a variety of alternatives need to be available. Not everyone with malaria parasites in their bloodstream shows the symptoms of malaria and the disease itself is becoming resistant to some of the drugs used to treat

“I remember it like it was yesterday; the high fever, the unbearable aches, the chills and the constant vomiting. I had it three times myself and so did my cousins. If my aunt was not a nurse, we probably would not be having this conversation right now.” said my good friend Virgile while describing his experience with Malaria. Virgile is from the Ivory Coast, where he lived the majority of his life before immigrating to the United States with his family. When I asked to speak to him to gain some insight on Malaria and its effect on the people of that region of West Africa, he was more than willing to help. He described his time in the Ivory Coast as a happy childhood. He remembers vividly the experiences that really make his place of birth home and was excited to share them with me. I wanted to understand the role that the country’s geographical location and cultural experiences played in the spread of Malaria. I had no idea that my friend had many firsthand encounters with the disease or that his aunt was a nurse who had treated thousands of patients with the disease. Malaria, locally called palu, is one of the greatest health priorities in the Ivory Coast because of its incidence and related morbidity and mortality. Although it affects people of all ages and sexes, the most at risk are children under 5 and pregnant women. Malaria is considered the number one killer amid children in Ivory Coast (ICMRT, n.d.). The cause of the illness is the bites from the female