Now, some people are more resistant to some diseases than others. Sickle cell anemia heterozygote humans can live with plasmodium alright.
What surprises me is that someone around an airport in Germany (urban area) actually died of malaria. Malaria causes intervals of very high fever which lead to hospitalization and treatment.
There was a good story of a Dutchman living in Mali who got malaria a few times (everyone does). It’s manageable with the meds.
Anyway he flies home, then develops symptoms. Goes to hospital and they freak. Full hazmat suits, isolation, doctors visiting from all over because they’d never seen it. Guy ends up dying because they wouldn’t give him the meds, because they didn’t know if it was safe, or what the right thing to do was.
Moral of the story is that for anyone spending time in malaria zones, take the meds home with you. If you get symptomatic, take the meds and maybe not go to hospital in the developed world. Meds I took was “coartem” and an injectable.
I don't know why immigration for humans and mosquitoes is so lax in Germany. Germany is also the country of the Marburg Virus.
https://www.n-tv.de/panorama/Zwei-Tote-durch-Flughafen-Malar...
Likely this happened because they have no expertise and didn’t know what to do.
Imagine if you showed up in a hospital in the us with a sting from some super intense scorpion that only exists is some obscure part of the world. They’ll try to help, but likely can’t do much.
"It [the Robert Koch Institute] said laboratory tests to determine the source of the infections were not expected to be available for several weeks. [...] The [Robert Koch] institute said malaria in Germany almost exclusively affects long-haul travellers who were infected in malaria-endemic areas, and that malaria transmitted within a German airport is rare. 'The lack of a travel history can lead to a delayed diagnosis. A delayed diagnosis increases the risk of a severe course of the diseases,' the institute said in its epidemiological bulletin."
In the US it's a few thousand dollars for the treatment.
There are definitely ways to rack up big bills fast, though.
garbawarb•57m ago
ceejayoz•51m ago
A concerted effort to treat cases and reduce habitat can prevent it, too. The US wiped it out in the 50s; new cases largely come from travel.
jmclnx•47m ago
tomjakubowski•46m ago
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8277918/
xhevahir•20m ago
matherial•46m ago
It's unlikely to become a problem again because the climate is not optimal and these countries are wealthy, have advanced healthcare systems, and can spray everything with DDT again if they feel like doing it.
nerdsniper•45m ago
I’m not sure the USA would have been successful eradicating malaria without using DDT or something similar.
DDT caused the Bald Eagle population to drop from about 400,000 birds to just 47 nesting pairs.
the-grump•39m ago
https://youtu.be/-UiCSvQvVys
Plenty more out there.
anttihaapala•39m ago
ceejayoz•27m ago
No human cases means no reservoir for the spring's new mosquitos to draw from. It's why Florida's safe these days, despite the climate.
xattt•42m ago
It is unlikely that malaria will establish itself, given that it gets cold and inhospitable to malaria-carrying mosquitos in Northern Europe. However, it is one of many things that could potentially be frog-boiled into existence in northern latitudes as a result of climate change.
I live in an area where mosquitos were unbearable this year. You couldn’t do outdoor activities without a mosquito net. It’s bad enough but I don’t want to imagine what it would be like if the threat of mosquito-borne illness was layered on.