Eradication of malaria in South East Asia has become an urgent necessity when a study showed that a newly discovered drug-resistant strain of a South East Asian malaria parasite has the ability to infect mosquito species in Africa. According to the scientists, the implication of this finding is dire where millions of lives may be put to risk.
The study, which is published in the Nature Communications journal, indicates that the parasite (Plasmodium falciparum) was first detected in 2008 in Cambodia and have since been seen across South East Asia. It proved resistant to the current leading front-line drug Artemisinin, which has been key in the current fight against malaria.
Apparently, since the 1950s the parasite has continually evolved to develop resistance against each drug that may initially have any success against it. In each instance, the first resistant strain would be seen along the Thai-Cambodia boarder before its spread across the globe.
While little is known about its transmission method, scientists are apprehensive of the spread of this specific strain. They are concerned that the parasite is able to jump species even when these species are separated by millions of years of evolution. This ability has never been detected in the wild.
Dr Rick Fairhurst of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID) qualifies, "All of us are very concerned about these parasites spreading to Africa, as parasites did in the past, but there was no reason to think these very highly differentiated parasites could even infect the major vector in Africa."
In the laboratory investigation, two species of Asian mosquitoes along with the main malaria-carrying mosquito in Africa were infected with the Plasmodium falciparum. The African mosquito (Anopholes coluzzii formerly called A. gambiae M) was easily infected. The scientists were, however, also surprised to see that no reduction was detected in the infection of the Asian mosquitoes.
According to Dr Fairhurst, "We have parasites that are not only resistant to Artemisinin... they have no barrier to infecting multiple different mosquitoes and then transmitting the infections all the way to another human."
An estimation by the World Health Organization (WHO) cites that malaria death rates have gone down globally by 60% with 6.2 million malaria-related deaths averted in the last 15 years.
