Throwing basket of diagnostics, drugs, vaccines and mozzie stoppers at malaria has not stopped the disease

Malaria is caused by a very complex organism (parasite) which was found in mosquitoes trapped in resin from 30 million years ago. The parasite that causes malaria has therefore been around for many years before our own species. Here, I will explore why the parasites that cause malaria are so difficult to beat. The disease we know as Malaria was thought to be caused by breathing “bad air” (mal aria) that emanates from swamps. This was not “fake news” but a lack of understanding and evidence at the time. As you probably know, swamps and stagnant water are excellent breeding sites for mosquitoes that transmit the Plasmodium parasites that cause the disease. To nourish her developing offspring, the female mosquito needs to feed on blood as an essential rich source of protein and you and I are the local restaurant. Should she have Plasmodium parasites (sporozoites) in her salivary glands, these are injected into the person she is biting along with her saliva and proteins to stop the blood clotting when she sucks up her meal. The sporozoites she injects very rapidly (30 minutes to three hours) travel to, recognise and invade liver cells, where they are more difficult for the host’s immune system to detect and fight. Of the five species of Plasmodium that cause malaria in humans, Plasmodium falciparum is the deadliest. Plasmodium falciparum is responsible for 95% of the deaths caused by malaria and most of the deaths are in Africa and in young children between five months and five years of age. P. falciparum parasites take some five to seven days to divide and develop in the liver before emerging as thousands of “merozoites” that each recognise, attach to and enter red blood cells. Inside a red blood cell, the parasite is hidden from your immune system and again divides and develops to produce 16 to 48 “schizonts” every 48 hours. As the parasite schizonts burst and break out of red blood cells releasing its waste products your body responds with a high temperature (fever).