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| Countries with Malaria in red |
Scientists trying to discover a better cure
to malaria are getting closer, with research on Tanzanian children who have an
antibody which stops the parasite from spreading. Only six percent of Tanzanian
children are born with this antibody, from a sample of 1000 Tanzanian children.
When mice were injected with this antibody, the survival rate from malaria was
twice as long (meaning mice with this antibody survived malaria twice as long),
and the number of malaria parasites in the mice’s bodies was four times
smaller. These researchers are hoping that this could be another step towards
lowering the number of deaths from malaria, but still a lot of testing must be
done before they can mass produce this antigen.
I
feel like any scientific advancement towards solving any disease, be it a human
disease or animal disease, are some of the best things the scientific community
can do; Especially trying to cure malaria, a disease that killed “more than
600,000 people in 2012”. It confuses me, however, how the antibody is only in
Tanzania, and why it is not in other cultures such as neighboring African
countries. I think that the governments of first world countries should fund
research to cure third world ailments, such as malaria, much more since it
seems that this research could be accelerated through more funding.
Article Source
Immune children aid malaria vaccine hunt
May 22, 2014
Rebecca Morelle,
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