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The Economist notes of a possible new medication to fight malaria:
IVERMECTIN, a drug employed for the treatment of worm infections, has a side effect. It has been known since the 1980s that it kills arthropods (ticks, mites, insects and so on) foolish enough to bite someone treated with it. That has led some researchers to wonder if it might be deployed deliberately against the mosquitoes which transmit malaria. Preliminary studies suggested so. Mosquitoes do, indeed, get poisoned when they bite people who have taken the drug. Moreover, even if a mosquito does not succumb, ivermectin imbibed this way is often enough to kill any malarial parasites it is carrying.
It's one thing to protect yourself from malaria, but the notion that the buggers will likely croak for biting me is quite enticing.
I googled and found the studies mentioned at MalariaJournal.com and at researchgate.net. The full text of the study can be downloaded here.
The second study mentioned in the article can be read at pubfacts.com, with a full text of the study downloadable from here.
(Score: 2) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Wednesday October 28 2015, @05:18PM
Interesting post. Malaria in the animal population is something that isn't talked about much, but eliminating it in humans won't do much good if there's a pool of it in livestock just waiting to cross back over.
> Note that its a lot more effective and long term and in the end, cheaper, to simply eliminate standing water and all that stuff. There's always some jackass in every neighborhood with a mosquito breeding back yard, but there are ways to "fix" that.
I am optimistic that malaria will be extinct within my lifetime. It's a well understood disease, it's a high priority for all sorts of influential organisations, there are many ways to attack it, and it has already been completely wiped out in certain parts of the globe. The only thing that prevents us from finishing the job is the sad political and economic state of the third world. However despite this progress is already being made.
As you say though, every attempt to fix the problem is hampered by ignorant people acting against their own best interests. This is why I think malaria will be killed with a combined approach. This drug will only be part of the solution. Reducing standing water will be another part, along with mosquito nets, perhaps those GM-mozzies that produce sterile eggs, fricking laser beams and who knows what else.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday October 29 2015, @12:46AM
fricking laser beams
That won't work, how do you get the sharks to where the mosquitos live?