h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi Wantering
Thank you for your really interesting article. It has made me realise how extremely fortunate I was.
My husband was a pilot and he was flying on Christmas Day 1951. In order to give the children a treat when he returned we took them to Lake McIlwaine, outside of Salisbury(now Harare) on Boxing Day at about four in the afternoon in order to have a BBQ at the side of the Lake.
Ten days later he was flying again and I had gone down to stay with my sister-in-law at a little farming town called Gatooma. At six o'clock my eldest son aged two fell ill with a high fever. At seven o'clock my second son fell ill with a high fever and at 8 o'clock my baby daughter aged six weeks fell ill with a high fever. Fortunately my sister-in-law had some experience of malaria. She called her GP and within the hour he had given quinine injections to the three children. Fortunately they recovered and never ever had malaria again.
This is itself is remarkable because very often once one has had malaria it frequently recurs.
I do know that if ever we went to an area which we knew had mosquitoes we all used to sleep under nets - and we also used something called Citronella and burnt special candles whose name escapes me. I did not know that mozzies were now resistant to quinine. I wonder if it is the use of anti-biotics which has made them resistant?
Talking about natural remedies, I remember when I used to use pyrethrum to kill bugs and pests in my garden. Then all of a sudden it was withdrawn from the market and DDT was used instead. I wonder why that happened, and would pyrethrum and quinine still be efficacious if DDT had not been invented?
I am indeed fortunate that this dreadful scourge did not take my three children who all succumbed from the bite of probably a few mozzies with two hours of one another. Greetings AR1

My humble apologies Felonius Monk for attributing the article on Malaria to Wantering and not yourself. I hope you will forgive me! at contrite AR1

I wish I HAD written it. As you will have realised, this is one of my biggest causes for rants.I get so angry with people who don't take precautions.
My older son was about 18 months old when we were holidaying beside Lake Malawi. He became violently ill, losing fluid from both ends, We hurtled at ridiculous speeds to the nearest hospital where they pumped him full of quinine. I was always privately convinced it was cholera, but an overdose of quinine didn't do him any harm, although he lost five pounds in weight that day.29 years later- almost to the day- he persuaded a lovely Irish lady that he was a good enough health risk to marry

Malaria eracication and mosquito control should be taken up on a war-footing since thousands of people in all countries except perhaps rich countries like USA and Europe are getting victimised everyday in Africa,Asia and Latin American countries.
since the parasite has developed resistance to the drugs and the mosquito vector to the insectides like DDT,and the politicians and officials in poor countries are so apathetic ,inefficient and corrupt that the incidence of the disease is fast increasing ,leading to more poverty and sickness.since it is not a serious problem for rich nations ,intelligent scientists do not bother to develop new methods to solve the menace .If every year about 400 to 500 million people are attacked by malaria and about one to two million people die due to this preventable disease,what does the educated and enlightened community do about it ,except to remain silent spectators?
please think about these life and death issues and take action at your earliest
Prof .T.Shivaji Rao

Well, I hope I've broken my silence about it to some. I wouldn't class myself as an expert in the field, just a lay observer who has strong feelings about the subject. It's difficult to know what to do other than try to bring it to the attntion of others, as I have done here.

Perhaps airing the subject on 360 might be a good idea?

Well, I hope I've broken my silence about it to some effect. I wouldn't class myself as an expert in the field, just a lay observer who has strong feelings about the subject. It's difficult to know what to do other than try to bring it to the attntion of others, as I have done here.

Perhaps airing the subject on 360 might be a good idea?

Dear Wandering
Thank you so much for your reply. Do you think that your son DID have malaria or cholera? I wonder if quinine would have cured him of cholera? What I am still not certain of and that is does someone who has been bitten by a mozzie and gets malaria get better if s/he has an injection of quinine? Or is the malaria now resistant to quinine? Lots of questions.
Congratulations on your son's engagement/marriage. I loved Lake Malawi. Where were you. It is such a beautiful country. Have your read Lourens v.d.Post's book "Venture to the |Interior". A marvellous story about his visit to Malawi.
I see that you are in Hong Kong with Dr. Montague Trout - who loves Botswana!!I wonder if you will have an Asian meet. We have just had a splendid London one which I enjoyed no end. Sincere regards AR1

Dear Professor Shivaji Rao,
We meet again but on a slightly different site.
I was under the impression that you were at the Earth Summit meeting in Johannesburg. How does one get rid of malaria? By eradicating all the places where mosquitoes breed which are pools of water and water. It seems incredible that it has not yet been possible to devise something which can be sprayed onto water and which would kill the larvae of the mosquito and yet not render the water unsuitable for human consumption. Perhaps one could initiate a "malaria week" something in the way of what was done with Aids. I would agree with you that it is no longer a problem in the West and hence their reason probably for not continuing with research into suitable drugs for the eradication of the dreadful illness. Would it be the sensible way to take it up with the drug companies. My question in the first posting as to whether it was the advent of DDT which had made the mosquito immune to quinine was relevant I think. And if it is that well then it is going to have to be an extremely well-directed approach to get them to think of something to eradicate the disease. I do not know what the incidence of the illness is, but believe that it is very necessary to have empirical evidence of the true position before we make any approaches to the relevant organisations. I wonder if Medcins sans Frontieres would have any idea.
I think it would be wonderful to have your guidance. Thank you for bringing this dreadful sourge to our notice. Very sincerely, AR1

Dear FM,
Well, you see that you have certainly initiated quite a discussion!. Perhaps if we even had a census of h2g2 members who had had malaria; how they had got it; where they had got it; how was it cured; did they have another attack/s. I could certainly try and devise a questionnaire which I hope would be relevant.
Professor Rao has already spoken about the conditions of poverty etc. on 360 and that is where I first met him.
Sincere good wishes AR1 <schooloffish?

How about us getting together a chain email telling the recipient to blast off a concerned email to the Government about this disease? It might work...

All the best
FM

Sounds a great idea FM. But I am such a rabbit at doing things like that that I would only be able to follow your lead and would not know how to set up the mechanics of a chain letter on the Internet.Regards AR1

I had malaria several times as a child, including Black Water Fever which nearly killed me.

Does anyone know how long it can stay in the body? While at college about 11 years after I last lived in a malarial country, I suffered from a recurrent fever which was never diagnosed, but which had close similarities to malaria, but I (and my G.P.) discounted that because it was so long since I'd been exposed. I've recently read something which suggests the possibility of recurrences up to twenty years after the initial infection, which would mean I might only now be out of the danger zone.

One way you can limit the breeding of mosqitoes in drier areas is by pouring oil onto the surface of water tanks. This prevents the larvae from using the water surface tension to support them while they breathe, and they therefore die. In desert areas where the mosqitoes can breed only in water tanks (the only permament water supply) you can avoid having your own private supply of mosquitoes this way. Unfortunately this only works with water supplies where water for consumption is drawn from below the water level.

Hi Bernardette,
I think that the forms of malaria that stay dormant are P. vivax and P. ovale. They have a hypnozoite stage which lies low in the body and then recurs when the immune system is at a low ebb. They are nowhere near as dangerous as falciparum, however.

I remember we had a large plastic pond in our garden when I was a kid. We hadn't yet got around to sinking it in the ground and putting fish in it. It filled up with rainwater, and soon the mosquitos arrived, laying their little rafts of eggs. We didn't get bitten so they must have been the species that lived off plant juices. They seem to be crafty little bleeders as they exploit any stagnant little pond quickly.

Apparently my Grandfather went down with Malaria every time he tried to give up smoking, presumably because of the stress.

Even the milder forms are really unpleasant to the sufferer, even if they are not life threatening.

Where did you grow up? It sounds like it was a country in the East.

You might want to have a look at the latest New Scientist. In it they describe a genetic technique for completely wiping out the Anopheles msoquito: a sort of DNA-based 'smart weapon.'. They can't use it soon enough, as far as I'm concerned.