WUWT recently carried a guest post from Indur Goklany titled Smacking Down Malaria Misconceptions which generated a lot of contentious comments, inflammatory rebuttal posts, and even a permanent ban of Ed Darrell from WUWT because he claims I’ve called Rachel Carson a “mass murderer” (something I’ve never written nor said) yet refuses to retract his false statement and apologize for putting words in my mouth.
All that pointless bluster aside, I found this story below very interesting and encouraging, because if it goes forward to the logical and hopeful conclusion, the arguments over DDT and other pesticide uses to fight malaria will fall by the wayside. I think we can all agree that like the success with smallpox, we look forward to the day when malaria could be eradicated from Earth. – Anthony
Malaria’s newest pathway into human cells identified
Development of an effective vaccine for malaria is a step closer following identification of a key pathway used by the malaria parasite to infect human cells. The discovery, by researchers at The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, provides a new vaccine target through which infection with the deadly disease could be prevented.
Each year more than 400 million people contract malaria, and more than one million, mostly children, die from the disease. The most lethal form of malaria is caused by the parasite Plasmodium falciparum. Part of the parasite’s success lies in its ability to deploy multiple ways to invade red blood cells, a process essential for the survival of the parasite within the human host.
Professor Alan Cowman, head of the institute’s Infection and Immunity division, led the research with Dr Wai-Hong Tham, Dr Danny Wilson, Mr Sash Lopaticki, Mr Jason Corbin, Dr Dave Richard, Dr James Beeson from the institute and collaborators at the University of Edinburgh.
For decades, it has been known that malaria parasites use proteins called glycophorins as a means of entering red blood cells. This new research reveals an alternative pathway used by the parasite to enter red blood cells. The pathway does not involve glycophorins, instead requiring the binding of a parasite molecule named PfRh4 to Complement Receptor 1 (CR1), a common protein found on the surface of red blood cells.
“The parasite is like a master burglar – it will try a variety of different methods to get into the house, not just the front door,” Professor Cowman said. “Although the human body has evolved a variety of methods to keep the parasite out, it keeps finding new ways to get in.”
Professor Cowman said the PfRh family of surface proteins is involved in the recognition of red blood cell receptors, which allows the parasite to attach to the red blood cell surface and gain entry.
“We think that the parasite uses this protein to correctly identify the red blood cell and say ‘Yes, this is the one we want to invade’, it’s like a quality assurance process,” Professor Cowman said.
“The PfRh4-CR1 pathway is one of the most important of the pathways we’ve identified for entry of malaria parasites into cells,” Professor Cowman said. “We are now at the stage where we have identified the best combination of proteins for a vaccine, and are ready to start clinical development.
“When both glycophorin and CR1 pathways are blocked, there is a 90 per cent decrease in infection of the cells with the parasite. These results suggest that if a vaccine were to stimulate the immune system to recognise and generate antibodies to the prevalent invasion pathways, there is a good chance it would lead to a significant decrease in malaria infection.”
The research was published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. The study was supported by the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia, the Darwin Trust of Edinburgh, the Wellcome Trust and the Victorian Government.
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personally I,d rather they worked out how to damage the mozzies.
seems a vaccine is the” promise” for everything that ails us.
Mosquitoes lay their eggs in stagnant pools of water, where they hatch into swimming larvae before the airborne adults ultimately emerge. Mosquitoes usually feed upon nectar, but the females drink blood to provide extra supplements for their eggs when they are preparing to lay. This is when they become a nuisance to humans and can transmit parasites such as malaria and other blood-borne diseases.
Repel the boarders!
Scientists have found that the backswimmer, which is similar to a water boatman, releases a “scent,” known as predator-released kairomones, that scares off mosquitoes – although humans can’t smell them. Backswimmers prey on the larvae of the biting insects, and so female mosquitoes have developed a tendency to avoid areas where they detect chemicals given off by the predators and avoid laying eggs where they are present.
If people can spray themselves and their clothes with this chemical, it will make them immune to mosquitoes.
I think national governments should divert money from climate modeling into malaria research. After all, the IPCC has assured us that AGW will rapidly increase the spread of malaria (though apparently there is no “consensus” on that claim given Dr. Reiter’s resignation, for example) so they should not mind.
That would be good. Just as other vaccines have reduced illness and deaths it also resulted in an explosion in the populations and a malaria vaccine will do the same.
There would still be a need to repel and kill the little blood sucking critters.
To strictly follow their mandate, their hearts, and their attitudes towards science and the “natural world” of unspoiled nature, the EPA, Greenpeace, WWF, PETA, and the UN/WHO would immediately (and successfully) get an injunction against using the vaccine BECAUSE it would lead to extermination of the malaria virus.
Kate says: …Scientists have found that the backswimmer, which is similar to a water boatman, releases a “scent,” known as predator-released kairomones, that scares off mosquitoes – although humans can’t smell them….”
Citation, please?
how can anyone claim to be reasonable and reject DDT as an effective Malaria tool ? It may not be perfect but to argue that there are more effective tools is simply nonsense …
Keeping the little critters from biting is important but DEET is not always the chemical of choice…despite how the FDA is now decrying the use of “natural” products in favor of the large chemical companies that supply the commercial brands. (What a surprise!).
We produce a catnip oil (nepetalactone) insect repellent creme that has been used in Africa will good results as well as here in the Great White North. Our “deep woods” version includes neem oil and both also contain a variety of other essential oils that give the product a pleasant odor. The cream base is also good for the skin but we have an alcohol based spray for golfers.
Re: “I think we can all agree that like the success with smallpox, we look forward to the day when malaria could be eradicated from Earth.”
Actually, I know more than a few “environmentalists” who would think that a crime against nature. As a matter of fact, many “environmentalist” academics embrace disease, no matter how horrid a death it may cause. For example, the classic instance in 2006 where environmentalists championed and applauded the ebola virus at the Texas Academy of Science —
http://www.sas.org/tcs/weeklyIssues_2006/2006-04-07/feature1p/index.html
Kate says:
September 27, 2010 at 6:49 am
If you replace the word mosquitoes with politicians your post would not change a bit 🙂
Kate says:
September 27, 2010 at 6:49 am
“[…]Mosquitoes usually feed upon nectar, […]”
Do tell… I never ran across that in all my years.
DDT used to work great; and now they understand a lot more about proper application. No need to wait for a vaccine; but good luck anyway.
Steve Goreham in his book “Climatism!” discusses malaria and points out that The World Health Org. in 2006 started using DDT again. The WHO says that science does not support the claims of some that DDT would cause a silent spring. Goreham also says that DDT should not be used in agricultural areas.
I’ll gladly say that Rachel Carson was to William Ruckelshaus (the then Head of the EPA who unilaterally and without foundation banned DDT) as Al Gore is to Maurice Strong (the architect of the IPCC and the drive to create a carbon crisis, a takeover of world energy and a one-world government).
As the DDT ban has killed millions, I hold her complicit in these deaths.
Google ‘ predator-released kairomones malaria ‘ and one should find oddles of interesting info~
Rachael Carson was testing at a time when there WAS abuse of DDT and other chemicals. At the levels it was applied in and the areas, she was correct.
it was advertised as so safe that your kids could run through the sprays for heavens sake…
overuse and abuse has always created problems. glyphosate now is yet another classic example.
our govt pushed asbestos housing as safe affordable and desirable…now its a millstone for any homeowner.
If its sounds too good to be true, it is!
This may be one of the most important advances in malaria control to date. It is probably not a magic bullet nothing is. A solid vaccine, combined with the “usual” other pathogen control measures, would go a long way toward full control if not elimination. I think we all, the researchers included, need to proceed with caution and not over sell just one aspect of this truly complex parasitic disease.
amicus curiae says:
September 27, 2010 at 9:28 am
it was advertised as so safe that your kids could run through the sprays for heavens sake…
I was one of those kids, it was my hobby during summertime, now I am 69 years old and no illnesses at all, thanks God. DDT is insoluble. Mrs Carson, as far as I know, was a Malthusian.
If the world spent just 10 per cent of what it has spent on the alleged danger of AGW I’m sure we would have licked Malaria. Maybe governments and green groups no longer care enough because it has already been eradicated in the USA, UK, Scandinavia and Russia. At least Bill Gates isn’t wasting all his money on trying to cool the earth. :o)
http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/summary/246/10/1133-b
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1253858/
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29022220/
If this is successful where is the food required to fill the extra stomachs going to come from? Perhaps even more demands for international ‘aid’ are in the offing.
Thanks, Anthony, this one is right up my alley! (I’m an infectious disease epidemiologist by training).
DDT? Great stuff, but spraying it willy-nilly throughout the ecosystem is both harmful and wasteful. I’m very impressed with the results obtained from very focused spraying of DDT onto interior walls in endemic areas, please see: http://pubs.acs.org/cen/government/84/8430gov1.html
“The South African government has used DDT to spray the interior walls of houses. That and effective medications have reduced South Africa’s annual malaria death toll from 458 in 2000 to 89 in 2006. With this method, DDT spraying needs to be repeated only once every six to eight months.”
So, a combination of improving drugs, prudent application of insecticides, and eventual development of a vaccine may reduce or even eliminate this scourge!
More children presently die from malaria than from global warming, right? Our funding priorities are goofed up.
Except for the lies of Rachael Carson, 30-40 million African children under the age of 5 would have not have had to die of malaria — You would think that getting DDT back into production, WHO authorized it in limited production in 2006 after concluding their 30 year exahausting study and finding no deleterious effects except on mosquito, would be top priority. It’s currently legal to product DDT but the IMF ties their African nation loans to not producing … Strange. Why would they not care for the children.
Was WHO’s DDT study sort of like today’s global warming science, I do see similarities with political goals and science ….
You would think it would be a top priority of Obama, to save the 1.5 million children a year that needlessly die of malaria. It’s nice they may have found a way to stop the disease, but I am an Occam Razor sort of guy, why not just kill the mosquitoes the most effective way known, with DDT.
Compare the billions wasted each year on AGW climate studies to this:
Malaria kills an African child every 30 seconds.
Malaria is responsible for 20 percent of Africa’s under-five mortality and 10 percent of the continent’s overall disease burden.
Less than five percent of people at greatest malaria risk have insecticide-treated mosquito nets to sleep under.
http://www.alertnet.org/topkillerdiseases.htm
Quick facts.
http://www.control-mosquitoes.com/
With regard to the deet alternatives…
All the same, I’ll stick with deet. I have tried just about everything and found nothing works nearly as well as >25% deet. Heck, having allegedly grown up in Northern Ontario I was regularly slathered with the deet most of my life and I’m perfectly normal! (Twitch, twitch.) Nothing wrong with me! Well, ok… Maybe I have three arms, an extra ear and a nasty foot disorder, but aside from that, I’m fit as a fiddle!
Seriously though, deet works better than anything else IMHO.
The malaria parasite (N.B. – NOT virus!) has managed to evade many other attempts at stopping it. This is a promising “step closer,” not the final word.