Cookies on this website

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you click 'Accept all cookies' we'll assume that you are happy to receive all cookies and you won't see this message again. If you click 'Reject all non-essential cookies' only necessary cookies providing core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility will be enabled. Click 'Find out more' for information on how to change your cookie settings.

Although malaria has been largely eradicated from temperate countries, it is on the increase in the tropics. Infection with Plasmodium falciparum affects a vast number of people and kills over a million annually. Severe malaria is a multisystem disease affecting particularly the central nervous system (causing coma and convulsions), the kidneys (resulting in acute tubular necrosis), and the liver (contributing to lactic acidosis and hypoglycaemia). Acute pulmonary oedema (acute respiratory distress syndrome) may occur in adults particularly in association with renal impairment. In children these symptoms are rare, whereas hypoglycaemia, lactic acidosis and severe anaemia are more common. Malaria should be suspected in any febrile patient living in or returning from the tropics, and a blood smear examined. Chloroquine has been the mainstay of antimalarial treatment for the past 40 years, but resistance in P. falciparum is now widespread throughout the tropics and has recently been recognised in P. vivax from Oceania. Sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine resistance is also common. Fortunately, quinine, and the newly introduced compounds, halofantrine and mefloquine, can be relied upon nearly everywhere. The most rapidly acting and effective of all antimalarial drugs, artemisinin and its derivatives, have come from China. They offer a genuine prospect of reducing mortality from malaria in the tropics.

Type

Journal

The Medical journal of Australia

Publication Date

08/1993

Volume

159

Pages

197 - 203

Addresses

Faculty of Tropical Medicine, Mahidol University, Bangkok, Thailand.

Keywords

Humans, Pregnancy Complications, Parasitic, Malaria, Malaria, Falciparum, Chloroquine, Antimalarials, Combined Modality Therapy, Pregnancy, Drug Resistance, Africa, Asia, Southeastern, Papua New Guinea, Female