Malaria News |
Travelers' Malaria 
What is malaria? The answer to this seemingly simple question is, in fact, quite complex, for it depends to a large extent on who is infected. It is particularly difficult for reference books to describe a 'typical' patient with malaria, since plasmodium infection in a partially immune, long-term resident of a malaria-transmission zone is likely to be very different from acute malaria in a nonimmune traveler to the same area. Given these considerations, Travelers' Malaria provides an especially helpful resource for practitioners of travel medicine in areas where malaria is not endemic, such as the United States, Canada, and western Europe.
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Transfusion-Transmitted Malaria in the United States from 1963 through 1999
Transfusion-transmitted malaria is uncommon in the United States. After the report of three cases of complicated Plasmodium falciparum infection acquired by transfusion, we reviewed all cases of transfusion-transmitted malaria reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) from 1963 through 1999. Careful screening of donors according to the recommended exclusion guidelines remains the best way to prevent transfusion-transmitted malaria.
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Increased Susceptibility to Malaria during the Early Postpartum Period
Pregnancy is associated with increased susceptibility to malaria. It is generally agreed that this increased risk ends with delivery, but the possible persistence of increased susceptibility during the puerperium has not been investigated. Among women who live in areas with high rates of transmission of malaria, the susceptibility to malaria is highest during the second and third trimesters of pregnancy and the early postpartum period.
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Rolling Back Malaria in Pregnancy
Malarial infection during pregnancy is a major public health problem in tropical and subtropical regions throughout the world. In endemic areas, pregnant women are the main group of adults at risk for malaria. Although 40 percent of the world's population is at risk for malaria, in pregnant women the disease has been most widely evaluated in sub-Saharan Africa, where 90 percent of the global burden of malaria and deaths from the disease occur. Plasmodium falciparum infection during pregnancy increases the chance of maternal anemia, abortion, stillbirth, prematurity, intrauterine growth retardation, and low birth weight (defined as a weight of <2500 g), the greatest risk factor for neonatal mortality.1 The effects of the other three parasites that cause malaria in humans (P. vivax, P. malariae, and P. ovale) are less clear.
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