A Child Just Died of Malaria

What were you doing in the last 30 seconds? Every 30 seconds a child dies of malaria unnecessarily. Crazy, isn’t it?

Malaria is one of the world’s deadliest diseases- killing three times more children than

HIV/AIDS. Malaria is an infection caused by a parasite and carried from person to person by mosquitoes. It is preventable and curable yet over 500 million people contract it per year and more than one million people die from it annually —most of them young children living in Africa.

Once contracted, you start to get a headache, feel hot with a fever and tired; you begin vomiting and have mostly flu-like symptoms. If not treated, you die.

There is no vaccine to prevent this.

The economic effects are huge, too. A Reuters report says that a single bout of malaria in Africa leads to a loss of around ten working days. Additionally, malaria can lead to loss of tourist revenue and international investment. The Roll Back Malaria Campaign reports that malaria has been estimated to cost Africa more than US$ 12 billion every year in lost GDP, even though it could be controlled for a fraction of that sum.

Prevention

You can take daily or weekly pills that reduce your chances of contracting malaria. I spent $1,400 on medication for the nine months I will be in Tanzania. I also sprayed my clothing with a repellent and insecticide that lasts 6 weeks even with several washes; these spray cans cost me about $55. If you make less than $2 a day (as many of the people in high malaria zones do), you certainly could not afford these options (which are not even full-proof), especially since you would have to use them not for months like I will, but for every day of your life. So what to do?

There are many ways to reduce the transmission of malaria. In fact, simple things such as using a bednet treated with insecticide have proven to reduce transmission by 50%. A more controversial activity is the spraying of DDT indoors. This has been banned for over 30 years sparked by the book, Silent Spring, which highlighted concerns for DDT’s effect on the environment. The WHO recently lifted the ban citing little evidence of major environmental harm (in comparison to the tragedy of malaria). Beyond finding a vaccine cure, other prevention methods proposed by scientists have even included genetic mutation of the mosquitoes which transmit malaria. To learn more about malaria and specifically the types of solutions being implemented to eradicate it, click here.

Seems so daunting.

So why should we care? Beyond the fact that our hearts hurt when we see a child dying an unnecessary death or we think about the loss of potential innovation and economic productivity from malaria ridden regions. Some scientists predict that in the US and Europe, a re-emergence of malaria will soon come about even though it is mostly eradicated now.

This is everyone’s problem.

As my Tribeca (New York Based Training) Phase of the Acumen fellowship has ended, I am now moving to Tanzania. I will work with an amazing social enterprise which is manufacturing long-lasting insecticide treated bednets (AtoZ). We are trying to build private market distribution channels for the nets…in hope of sustainable ways to stomp out malaria.

What a wonderful adventure this will be…and malaria is certainly an important inspiration for action.

Image Source: REUTERS/IFRC/Marko Kok