The science of medicine has advanced by leaps and bounds in the past few decades of human civilization leading to the prosperity of our species. We age slower, live longer. But only some of us; many of our brethren are not so fortunate.
Like a dark cloud in a silver sky, there are certain scourges that have become the bane of human beings. Certain diseases that refuse to go and take too many lives each year. That too of children and people living in squalor and apathy. Several hundreds of children die each year in many parts of the world due to malaria. The bite of the female anopheles variety carried from one human being to another consumes the life of a child in Africa every 45 seconds, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Children across the world are particularly vulnerable due to their low immunity. African children are even more susceptible because of the under-hygienic living conditions in which many of them try to survive. The malaria-carrier mosquitoes thrive in humid conditions and wherever waste accumulates. Poverty forces people, especially children, in Africa to live in squalor. Also, poor people are unable to sustain malaria treatment costs over a prolonged period.
Many countries in the temperate and sub-tropical climatic zones have been able to eradicate the disease but tropical countries have not been able to. Also, research in the past few decades has revealed that anti-malaria vaccinations have failed or been largely ineffective as malaria parasites quickly become resistant to drugs and reappear in other forms. This has been one reason why organizations like WHO and UNICEF moved away from focusing on malaria eradication to malaria control.
Two of the most recommended malaria-control methods are: sleeping inside the cover of insecticide-treated mosquito nets and spraying the interiors of residences with residual insecticides.
Since inability to eradicate malaria still challenges the medical world, taking anti-malaria preventive measures is the only way out.
