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Malaria currently affects more people in the World than any other disease. Malaria can kill. ... Malaria can also affect its sufferers by recurring time and again causing prolonged suffering, over a period of years.
Another startling fact is that some ninety percent of the World’s malaria occurs in Africa As a result the advanced first world countries are much more likely to concentrate their research and countermeasure efforts on a disease such as AIDS, rather than malaria. The implication is that Africa will have to champion the fight against malaria, and not rely on first world initiative and leadership.
In South Africa malaria cases, as reported by the South African Department of Health, were 1623 in 1974, with 16 deaths (the year DDT was banned for agricultural use) but twenty years later, by 1994 had risen to thirteen thousand! ... In 1996, total officially recorded malaria cases were 27 035 with 163 deaths. ... The report says that 33% of the World was by 1994 classified as “Areas where endemic malaria was considerably reduced or eliminated and where the situation is now unstable or deteriorating”. The report furthermore states that malaria affects more people in the World than any other disease – in excess of 500 million annually, with over two million deaths (WHO Report 1994).
The prime way to curb malaria is not so much in the treatment of patients as in attacking the malarial mosquito before it transfers the malaria parasite to its victim.
Current work being carried out by Prof Manuel Patarroyo, Director of the Institute of Immunology, University of Colombia, Bogota, on a new range of malaria vaccines, is encouraging, and should undoubtedly be supported by the international community, but this does not address the malaria vector, but rather aims at the patient or potential patient. Prof Patarroyo has produced the first chemical vaccine, and also the first vaccine for malaria (Spurgeon 1995). Colombia, like areas of Africa, also has a significant malaria problem, and so there is a domestic need to aggressively attack the disease. ...
In the past, the most effective anti-mosquito pesticide was DDT. ... Unfortunately much of the anti-DDT propaganda and claims concerning its supposed dangers were inaccurate, and at times plain and simply contrived to gain political advantage.
The resulting banning of DDT in the USA and other first World countries resulted in the spread of an essentially forced ban of the pesticide in many other countries, including South Africa. Since the banning of DDT, Malaria has increased rapidly as has malaria-related deaths. In the past year in southern Africa the increase in malaria cases has been alarming. Malaria cases are not only increasing in total numbers but are also being found in cities such as Pretoria and Pietersburg in South Africa, and Bulawayo in Zimbabwe which are far away from the actual malarial areas. ... In northern Namibia, malaria cases in the first half of 1996 compared to 1995 increased by 40% and children under five years of age made up 30% of the deaths. In Zimbabwe, malaria is increasing dramatically, and in 1997 there were 1. ...
It is time to re-examine the DDT ban.
Recently in Zimbabwe a Health Ministry spokesman, Dr Paulinus Sikhosana, was quoted as saying that Zimbabwe intended to re-introduce DDT in an attempt to reduce the spread of malaria. He said that they intended to use
10 000 tons of DDT. Dr Sikhosana also said that he did not quite know how the DDT ban would be overturned. ... This announcement resulted in predictable anti-DDT hysteria in Zimbabwe and in South Africa.
DDT History
DDT is a powerful, effective insecticide that was originally discovered chemically in 1874 but its insecticide properties were only discovered in 1939 by Paul Müller, a chemistry researcher working in Switzerland. ... The first patents were taken out in Switzerland and Britain in 1942, and DDT immediately changed the face of the World even though it was a closely guarded secret. ... DDT eliminated this problem in the Second World War, by killing body lice. ... DDT was used on all prisoners and within days the lice infestation was wiped out. ...
As an example of DDT’s effectiveness; annual cases of malaria in Sri Lanka in 1948, were 2. ... Then DDT was introduced to suppress the malaria- carrying mosquito, and by 1963 the annual number of cases had fallen to 17.
World-wide, the introduction of DDT had a dramatic effect on reducing malaria. For example, in Natal (a warm coastal province in South Africa) in 1932, the estimated annual death toll from malaria was between 10 000 and 22 000 (Smit et al 1992). The later introduction of DDT eradicated this menace.
DDT was also hailed as the miracle pesticide since it was so selective in its action. DDT had replaced earlier pesticides such as arsenic and nicotine, that were highly toxic to all life. DDT however, was highly effective against target pests such as lice and mosquitoes but had no effect on humans, mammals, or indeed other larger insects, earthworms, and other soil organisms. Because it was so target specific, DDT was also used to improve crop yields dramatically by killing off agricultural insect pests.
Approximate Word count = 4229
Approximate Pages = 16.9
(250 words per page double spaced)
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