Malaria in Children

Abstract

Malaria is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in endemic areas, leading to an estimated 438,000 deaths in 2015. Malaria is also an important health threat to travelers to endemic countries and should be considered in evaluation of any traveler returning from a malaria-endemic area who develops fever. Considering the diagnosis of malaria in patients with potential exposure is critical. Prompt provision of effective treatment limits the complications of malaria and can be life-saving. Understanding Plasmodium species variation, epidemiology, and drug-resistance patterns in the geographic area where infection was acquired is important for determining treatment choices.

Keywords: Falciparum; Malaria; Plasmodium; Vivax.

Fig. 1

Spatial distribution of P falciparum (A) and P vivax (B) endemicity in 2010. Prevalence rates are presented in different populations and different scales based on species. The P falciparum map (A) shows the prevalence rate in 2 to 10 year olds (PfPR) and ranges from 0% to 70%; see color scale on map. The P vivax map (B) shows the prevalence rate in 1 to 99 year olds (PvPR) and ranges from 0 to greater than 7%. Shaded areas have unstable transmission (<0.1%), and hatched areas have greater than 90% prevalence of Duffy antigen negativity. Duffy antigen is required for the invasion of P vivax into the erythrocyte and is absent in some African populations. These maps are open source and made available by the Malaria Atlas Project (http://www.map.ox.ac.uk/map/) under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. (Reproduced from [A] Gething PW, Patil AP, Smith DL, et al. A new world malaria map: plasmodium falciparum endemicity in 2010. Malar J 2011;10:378; and [B] Gething PW, Elyazar IRF, Moyes CL, et al. A long neglected world malaria map: plasmodium vivax endemicity in 2010. PLoS Negl Trop Dis 2012;6(9):e1814.)