What is the most repeated failure in all of global health? It could well be the commitment to eradicate malaria. So why would anyone want to follow a long line of failures by becoming the umpteenth person to declare the goal of eradicating malaria? There's one reason. We should declare the goal of eradicating malaria because we can eradicate malaria.Each year malaria infects approximately 515 million people and kills more than 1 million. The disease has pillaged the African continent where malaria is the leading killer of children. Not only does the disease steal the lives of the children, malaria afflicts all of Africa by burdening health care systems, preventing the expansion of economies, stifling education, and inhibiting the overall development of African societies.
- Bill Gates, Malaria Forum Keynote Address on October 17, 2007
I recall being absolutely fascinated by Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel. One of the observations made by Diamond pertains to the origin of the Malaria scourge throughout the African continent:
The African way of life was designed to avoid mosquito-borne infection. Africans made their homes in high, dry areas when they could, away from the natural habitat of the mosquito. Also, African communities remained fairly small, which limited the level of disease transmission.
Unfortunately, the arrival of colonizing Europeans, with their steam trains, machine guns and dreams of industrial wealth, wreaked terrible damage on these centuries-old mechanisms of survival. Torn from their villages, forced to live and work together in massive numbers and in unsanitary conditions, tropical Africans fell ill as never before. The scourge of malaria throughout Africa today is, in part, the consequence of the destruction of a way of life which had existed for thousands of years.
Today, malaria is holding back progress on the continent of Africa. Besides killing millions of children under five, higher rates of transmission mean that adults now also become sick and suffer debilitation. This cripples economic productivity and traps the population in a cycle of poverty. In spite of a literacy rate of 80%, the tropical nation of Zambia has 10% child mortality and one of the poorest economies in the world – it's no coincidence that most Zambians are infected by malaria at least five times a year.
However, as Diamond proceeds to remark, Malaria is not only treatable now -- the disease is eradicable. And recently, we have seen an enormous push to treat and eradicate. We have seen countries like Thailand thrive and Singapore catapult itself to be known as one of the Four Asian Tigers due to containing malaria.
In addition to new drugs and vaccines being invented and distributed, a preventative measure that has gathered incredible momentum over the last few years is to provide households with insecticide-treated bed nets that families may sleep under. Bed nets have served as a successful means of reducing transmissions by providing protection to people when African mosquitoes do most of their feeding -- at night.
With a cost of only $10 per net, donating money to organizations such as Nothing But Nets that purchase and distribute bed nets has become increasingly popular. The New York Times labeled the movement as "hip" and equated it to a modern version of the March of Dimes, which helped combat Polio. All it took for me to realize the strength of the movement was to watch my younger brother call in to "American Idol Gives Back"and donate $100 to buy 10 bed nets. American Idol Gives Back has raised over $12 million for bed nets in the last two years.
Seventeen years after the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis was founded in 1938 to eradicate one of the most dreadful diseases of the 20th Century, a vaccine for Polio was developed. And here we have arrived at a pivotal point in eliminating yet another disease -- a disease to which millions have lost their lives to and the development of entire societies has been suppressed. And yet again we find ourselves with the knowledge, resources and fortitude to make an impact individually and collectively to eradicate malaria.
If you're interested in learning more or seeing how you can help, reference the following organizations:
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation - All Lives Have Equal Value.
Nothing But Nets - Send a Net. Save a Life.
UNICEF - For Every Child, Advance Humanity.
