Similar to some other major diseases, Malaria is also affecting millions of individuals all over the world and 90% of those are from Africa. Malaria is caused by a parasite known as Plasmodium that is transmitted through the bite of infected mosquitoes. After the bite took place, the parasites attack the liver and then infect the human red blood cells.
The symptoms of Malaria include:
- Fever
- Headache
- Vomiting which take place between 10 to 15 days after the bite
If you want to prevent the spread of Malaria you can also perform some methods like:
- Protecting the individuals in the area where Malaria is endemic.
- The utilization of prophylactic drugs
- Mosquito eradication
- Preventing yourself from mosquito bites
- When staying indoors, use some insecticides to control the vector of mosquitoes.
- The utilization of insecticidal nets might help to and this is applicable to those people who are having health issues.
Since the spread of Malaria seems to be uncontrollable, the University of Pennsylvania geneticists, in collaboration with an international team of scientists, have created a new picture of one way that the human genome has fought back. This international team was headed by Sarah Tishkoff, a Penn Integrates Knowledge professor with appointments in the genetics department in Penn’s Perelman School of Medicine and the biology department of biology in the School of Arts and Sciences, and Wen-Ya Ko, a postdoctoral fellow in the genetics department at the medical school. Together they did a genetic analysis of 15 ethnic groups across Africa, looking for gene variants that could explain differing local susceptibility to malaria.
On the other hand, Researchers from the University of Copenhagen also discovered VAR2CSA, which enable malaria parasites to accumulate in the placenta and therefore can be potentially used as the main component in a vaccine to trigger antibodies that defend pregnant women against malaria.
