Malaria parasites 'resist drugs'

[muriel_volestrangler]

Source: BBC

International scientists say they have found the first evidence of resistance to the world's most effective drug for treating malaria.

They say the trend in western Cambodia has to be urgently contained because full-blown resistance would be a global health catastrophe.

Drugs are taking longer to clear blood of malaria parasites than before.
...
The artemesinin family of drugs is the world's front-line defence against the most prevalent and deadly form of malaria.

Read more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/8073118.stm

[loudsue]

1. Oh man. That truly sucks. Malaria is so horribly painful

and there are so many people that can be exposed to it, who have no type of health care.... no access to health care to speak of.

[freedomnorth]

2. Malaria Cases

Territory size shows the proportion of all people living with malaria worldwide, that live there.

Of all the people living with malaria, 92% live in African territories. Parts of Mediterranean Africa have very low numbers of malaria cases. In contrast, almost half the people living in Uganda suffer from malaria. Uganda also has the most cases of malaria in the world. Most territories are barely visible due to the low number of malaria cases found there.

Malaria is a parasitic infection that is spread between people by mosquitoes. Incidence can be reduced by mosquito control and anti-malarial prophylaxis in some cases. It is treatable but drug resistance and loss of immunity occur. 7.2 million cases of malaria were recorded worldwide in 2003.