Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects vertebrates. The disease is widespread in the tropical and subtropical regions that exist in a broad band around the equator. This includes much of sub-Saharan Africa, Asia, and Latin America. In 2022, some 249 million cases of malaria worldwide resulted in an estimated 608,000 deaths, with 80 percent being five years old or less. Around 95% of the cases and deaths occurred in sub-Saharan Africa.
Causes Malaria is caused by single-celled microorganisms of the Plasmodium group. It is spread exclusively through bites of infected female Anopheles mosquitoes. The mosquito bite introduces the parasites from the mosquito’s saliva into a person’s blood. The parasites travel to the liver, where they mature and reproduce.
Signs and Symptoms Symptoms usually begin 10 to 15 days after being bitten by an infected Anopheles mosquito. Malaria typically presents with fever, fatigue, vomiting, and headaches. In severe cases, it can cause jaundice, seizures, coma, or death.
In those who have recently survived an infection, reinfection usually causes milder symptoms. This partial resistance disappears over months to years if the person has no continuing exposure to malaria.
Diagnosis Malaria is usually confirmed by the microscopic examination of blood films or by antigen-based rapid diagnostic tests (RDT).
Treatment There are a number of medications that can help prevent or interrupt malaria. Many of these medications are also used in treatment. Simple or uncomplicated malaria may be treated with oral medications. Artemisinin drugs are effective and safe in treating uncomplicated malaria. Artemisinin in combination with other antimalarials (known as artemisinin-combination therapy, or ACT) is about 90% effective when used to treat uncomplicated malaria.
For severe malaria, IV artesunate or quinine are first choice of treatment. Treatment of severe malaria also involves supportive measures including the management of high fevers and the seizures that may result from it, and monitoring for poor breathing effort, low blood sugar, and low blood potassium.
Herbal studies on Malaria
Traditional medicines have been used to treat malaria for thousands of years and are the source of the two main groups Artemisinin and Quinine derivatives) of modern antimalarial drugs. To date, 1277 plant species from 160 families used to treat malaria or fever have been listed on a database by The Research Initiative on Traditional Antimalarial Methods (RITAM) that was founded in 1999 with the aim of furthering research on traditional medicines for malaria. See
Olon tree As a result of a study conducted from 2011 to 2016, a traditional medicine from the tropical Olon tree, and another species of genus Zanthoxylum, was found to have synergistic compounds that kill both mosquitoes and their plasmodium parasites.
…