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Malaria Has Been Eliminated In Europe (qz.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the Monday-is-World-Malaria-Day dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Quartz reports that "Malaria cases in Europe have dropped from a peak of over 90,000 in 1995 to zero in 2015, according to the World Health Organization," who calls the "extraordinary but fragile" achievement a step towards eliminating malaria everywhere. Nine European countries had reported malaria cases, but agreed to focus their efforts on a full elimination of the mosquito-borne disease. "The WHO attributes success to improved surveillance systems, better mosquito control, and greater collaboration across borders," reports Quartz, noting it now provides a blueprint for other countries fighting the disease -- and a boost in morale.

126 comments

  1. Hooray Immigration! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    This victory will be short lived as the open-borders crowd lets in everyone with a pulse.

    1. Re:Hooray Immigration! by dave420 · · Score: 1

      That's not what's happening. I hope you know that and are trying to make some sort of point, as opposed to you weighing in on this discussion without the scantest understanding of it.

    2. Re:Hooray Immigration! by NotDrWho · · Score: 0

      How do you think they finally finished Malaria off? The radical Muslims blew it up.

      --
      SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
    3. Re:Hooray Immigration! by tw2k · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Yep, it's only the immigrants that transmit malaria as we all know. Some of those pro-science arseholes think it's something to do with mosquitos but as we know, they pay strict adherence to border controls so that is clearly bullshit.

    4. Re: Hooray Immigration! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      Okay how's this:

      "World's deadliest tropical disease eliminated from entirely non-tropical continent. Scientists claim victory."

    5. Re:Hooray Immigration! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Now that the first world is free of Malaria, they will send thousands to combat it where it matters, right? Africa, Middle East and Latin America are next, right?

    6. Re:Hooray Immigration! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nope, it was Jewish terrorism.

    7. Re:Hooray Immigration! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hear, hear. But then, we can't allow white people to simply have their own countries, can we!

      Otherwise, all the poor, hard done by, can't-make-their-own-countries-work non-whites will have to live around THEIR OWN KIND, which would be just awful for them!

      So, apparently most white people want to live around their own kind (hence the constant 'white flight' in every white country on Earth, the existence of hundreds of areas with more than the national average of non-whites in it - because MOST of the whites LEFT and MOST whites don't want to move INTO those areas), but that can't be allowed, and most non-whites want to live around white people, who don't want them around, and that SHOULD be forced on white people.

      So - anybody - please explain to me why you think whites, and ONLY whites, shouldn't be allowed to simply associate with their own kind, and then show me when the MAJORITY of white people asked for this.

    8. Re: Hooray Immigration! by kellymcdonald78 · · Score: 5, Informative

      Malaria isn't just a tropical disease. When I lived in Ottawa (most definitely not tropical), I went by the cemetery to those who built the Rideau canal, approximately 1000 people died building it, half of those from malaria. In 1830 one section of the canal had almost 800 cases of malaria out of 1300 workers. We just DDTed the hell out of everything in the 50's and 60's and pretty much wiped out malaria in North America

    9. Re: Hooray Immigration! by michelcolman · · Score: 5, Informative

      Malaria used to be widespread in countries like the Netherlands, which is decidedly non-tropical. They managed to eradicate it by treating patients and killing mosquitos using DDT. The reason it's now a "tropical" disease is because tropical countries are poor.

    10. Re: Hooray Immigration! by maharvey · · Score: 4, Informative

      For those interested in learning more:

      A widespread and potentially lethal human infectious disease, at its peak malaria infested every continent, except Antarctica.

      The coastal plains of southern Italy fell from international prominence when malaria expanded in the sixteenth century. At roughly the same time, in the coastal marshes of England, mortality from "marsh fever" or "tertian ague" (ague: via French from medieval Latin acuta (febris), acute fever) was comparable to that in sub-Saharan Africa today. William Shakespeare was born at the start of the especially cold period that climatologists call the "Little Ice Age", yet he was aware enough of the ravages of the disease to mention it in eight of his plays.

      Malaria was not referenced in the "medical books" of the Mayans or Aztecs. European settlers and their West African slaves likely brought malaria to the Americas in the 16th century.

      In 1717, epidemiologist Giovanni Maria Lancisi related the prevalence of malaria in swampy areas to the presence of flies and recommended swamp drainage to prevent it.

      Map of Malaria deaths in the USA in 1880: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_malaria#/media/File:AL1887_pg190_Map_Death_from_Malaria_(US,_1880_Census).jpg

      In the United States, the National Malaria Eradication Program (NMEP) was launched on 1 July 1947. This federal program — with state and local participation — had succeeded in eradicating malaria in the United States by 1951. Prior to the establishment of the NMEP, malaria had been endemic across much of the United States. By the 1930s, it had become concentrated in 13 southeastern states. (For example, in the Tennessee River Valley it had a prevalence of about 30% in 1933.)

      Malaria elimination has already been achieved in most of Europe, North America, Australia, North Africa and the Caribbean, and parts of South America, Asia and Southern Africa, according to the Malaria Elimination Group at UCSF.

    11. Re:Hooray Immigration! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This victory will be short lived as the open-borders crowd lets in everyone with a pulse.

      That's very insensitive against the life-challenged (some ignorant people call them undead, but please don't do that). Granted, a few of them want nothing but to feast on the delicious brains of the living, but most of them lack teeth and only want to hold your hand (and arms and legs so their comrades can feast on your brains).

    12. Re: Hooray Immigration! by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      Until WWI and partly till WWII the region I live, Karlsruhe, Germany, was Malaria infested. Not sure if the extremely cold winter from 1945 till 1949 had a play in it but meanwhile we have no Malaria since decades.

      On the other hand we are doing special anti Mosquito spraying here more or less every year. Simply to keep their numbers down.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
    13. Re: Hooray Immigration! by RockDoctor · · Score: 1

      Malaria was endemic in Italy and southern Greece within living memory. Diseases with appropriate symptoms were endemic in Frane and even southern Britain in the Georgian and Regency periods.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
    14. Re: Hooray Immigration! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But you do not want to admit diseases are so CENTRAL to African life they will NOT LET US do such thing as eliminate a disease. Paludism was distinct from malaria and it was also eliminated, then was equated to malaria and now malaria will go also, but Africans still keep paludism infections nurtured and at hand for when they become convenient because NO ONE will recognize the disease, and I am speaking of NYC. Have you SEEN an African turned Swedish? NO??? All light pink and smooth and funny eye colored and blonde dyed hair and eyes in psychosis though you d say they are just sweet? Plenty of them in the Big City. They NEED PALUDISM TO BECOME SWEATY. Humans sweat, Africans dont. Now do you see why these text is dangerous? WHAT DO YOU THINK a pinked African with paludism will do to the guys who live in the same place and will NOT KNOW they got paludism but will keep going to uninformed doctors to ask why they got so sweaty for no reply? Hope you do see the LOGIC of this despite being madness because we have to stop it before eradicating certain diseases, like malaria or paludism or parasitosises, etc.

    15. Re: Hooray Immigration! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This text should be a Gospel: But you do not want to admit diseases are so CENTRAL to African life they will NOT LET US do such thing as eliminate a disease. Paludism was distinct from malaria and it was also eliminated, then was equated to malaria and now malaria will go also, but Africans still keep paludism infections nurtured and at hand for when they become convenient because NO ONE will recognize the disease, and I am speaking of NYC. Have you SEEN an African turned Swedish? NO??? All light pink and smooth and funny eye colored and blonde dyed hair and eyes in psychosis though you d say they are just sweet? Plenty of them in the Big City. They NEED PALUDISM TO BECOME SWEATY. Humans sweat, Africans dont. Now do you see why these text is dangerous? WHAT DO YOU THINK a pinked African with paludism will do to the guys who live in the same place and will NOT KNOW they got paludism but will keep going to uninformed doctors to ask why they got so sweaty for no reply? Hope you do see the LOGIC of this despite being madness because we have to stop it before eradicating certain diseases, like malaria or paludism or parasitosises, etc.

  2. It will come back, though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    There's a large pool of the malaria microbe in the Thames Valley, and a large pool of mozquitos to carry it. But *currently* the winters are too cold to allow them to mix together and become viable human transfer vectors.

    And, no, deniers, don't give me that "Oh, AGW does *everything*" because according to you, AGW can't do ANYTHING, and I'm not saying it does everything. But climate is quite damn important to life. If you don't believe it, try living in a climate like the Antarctic centre, or the middle of the Sahel.

    After all, if the climate you live in changes, you can just adapt, right?

    1. Re: It will come back, though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The plague is also in the soil. It can be treated however. Still, these nasty diseases are lurking all around us.

    2. Re:It will come back, though by Andvari · · Score: 5, Informative

      No, there is not a large pool of the malaria parasite in the thames valley. This is a stupid statement. Malaria doesn't lie dormant in the environment, waiting for the right conditions to appear. It can only survive in the host or vector. The only place it can lie 'dormant' is within the human host. Given there have been no cases of malaria transmission in England for a very long time we can safely say that there is no 'large pool of the malaria microbe'. Your statement that winters being too cold to allow mosquito and parasite to mix together clearly indicates you've got no clue what you're talking about. The reason that cold weather prevents malaria is that the adult mosquitos are dead, only the eggs are present (and malaria doesn't live in mosquito eggs). If the adults are dead there are no transmission events because there are no mosquitos around to bite.

    3. Re:It will come back, though by greenfruitsalad · · Score: 2

      i think the spread of malaria was mainly stopped by the ridiculously dry years we've had in europe. there were months long periods without proper rain where i live.. last year, i wasn't bitten once. the year before that, maybe 2-3 times. the climate is simply becoming too dry for the mosquitoes to thrive. global warming FTW!

    4. Re:It will come back, though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      No, there IS a large reservoir in the Thames Valley.
      Sorry.

      And I never said it was dormant, I said that there was no vector to convert it to humans: mozzies. They need a certain amount of temperature for a minimum period of time for the parasite causing malaria in humans to grow to an infectious host in the mozquito.

      The parasite isn't dormant, I never said it was. YOU made that up.

      And being +5 doesn't make you right, in case anyone tries that card.

    5. Re:It will come back, though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is simply untrue. See for example The Netherlands here: http://www.compendiumvoordeleefomgeving.nl/indicatoren/nl0508-Jaarlijkse-hoeveelheid-neerslag-in-Nederland.html?i=9-54 that had a steady increase on average since the 1920s. Malaria used to be common there, called 'swamp fever', but has been eradicated through insecticide programs during the 1950s. Improving environmental control and anti-musquito measures in common househoulds (use of sprays, candles, insect screens) are far bigger factors.

    6. Re:It will come back, though by jafiwam · · Score: 2

      No, there IS a large reservoir in the Thames Valley. Sorry.

      And I never said it was dormant, I said that there was no vector to convert it to humans: mozzies. They need a certain amount of temperature for a minimum period of time for the parasite causing malaria in humans to grow to an infectious host in the mozquito.

      The parasite isn't dormant, I never said it was. YOU made that up.

      And being +5 doesn't make you right, in case anyone tries that card.

      You are factually wrong about how malaria works regardless of your opinion on AGW.

    7. Re:It will come back, though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Citation. Because to everything I understand and can find about malaria it doesn't reproduce in the body of the mosquito, it's transferred when the mosquito bites an infected person, then bites another person as when it injects the anticoagulant. I can't find a source that says it actually replicates in the mosquito.

    8. Re:It will come back, though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It becomes increasingly evident that you don't know what the word "dormant" means.

    9. Re:It will come back, though by Andvari · · Score: 5, Informative

      No, there IS a large reservoir in the Thames Valley. Sorry.

      And I never said it was dormant, I said that there was no vector to convert it to humans: mozzies. They need a certain amount of temperature for a minimum period of time for the parasite causing malaria in humans to grow to an infectious host in the mozquito.

      I'm not sure if you're trolling or not, but I'll reply on the off chance you are just misinformed.

      Plasomdium spp., the causal agent of malaria, lives in mosquitos and humans. It does not live anywhere else, not in the water or ground or air. It reproduces in humans and is spread to a mosquito when a person is bitten. The parasite is the re-transmitted back to a human when that mosquito bites again. The parasite does not require a certain temperature to grow to be infectious within the mosquito. The ONLY way the malaria parasite can be transmitted to a mosquito is via a human host. If no humans within a region have malaria, then there is no way for malaria transmission to occur, and thus no malaria.

      Following on from this, if there is no malaria in humans, the only disease reservoir will be the mosquito. If there is 0 prevalence of malaria within a region for longer than the lifespan of a mosquito (typically ~50 days) the malaria parasite will be eliminated.

    10. Re:It will come back, though by Gilgaron · · Score: 1

      Excellent response. For other readers desired more detailed information, the CDC has an excellent infographic here: http://www.cdc.gov/malaria/abo...

    11. Re:It will come back, though by Eunuchswear · · Score: 1

      climate is quite damn important to life. If you don't believe it, try living in a climate like the Antarctic centre, or the middle of the Sahel.

      While there is no way to live in the "Antarctic centre" without pretty high levels of life support technology their are many millions of people who live in the Sahel. Maybe you meant to write "Sahara"?

      --
      Watch this Heartland Institute video
    12. Re:It will come back, though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

      No, I'm factually right about how malaria works. Sorry.

    13. Re:It will come back, though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It seems that you don't know what asking what the word means actually means.

      Nothing, for a start.

      I know it's not the same as what I said. And insinuating that I don't understand a word when there's nothing to indicate it is the case is merely poisoning the well.

      Sorry.

    14. Re:It will come back, though by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      They need a certain amount of temperature for a minimum period of time for the parasite causing malaria in humans to grow to an infectious host in the mozquito.
      This is nonsense.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  3. Got to love beancounters by PsyMan · · Score: -1, Troll

    " Nine European countries had reported malaria cases, but agreed to focus their efforts on a full elimination of the mosquito-borne disease" Nine European countries had reported malaria cases, but agreed to retract those reports to pretend Europe was malaria free and give themselves a big pat on the back and thumb their nose at others. FTFY

    1. Re:Got to love beancounters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nine European countries had reported malaria cases, but agreed to retract those reports

      [citation needed]

    2. Re:Got to love beancounters by r1348 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Nine European countries reported cases in 1995, and zero reported cases in 2015.

    3. Re:Got to love beancounters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nine European countries reported cases in 1995, and zero reported cases in 2015.

      yeah but why let the facts get in the way of a good headline?

    4. Re:Got to love beancounters by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Even when the sky is mostly clear, some people still gaze sadly at the clouds, waiting for the impending rain.

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
    5. Re:Got to love beancounters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More correctly, nine countries in the WHO Europe and former USSR region reported cases in 1995.

    6. Re: Got to love beancounters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In 1995 the had 9.

      Do Americans still have schools?

    7. Re:Got to love beancounters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yup, droughts are hard times.

    8. Re: Got to love beancounters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Because modeling statistical tends across microscopic datasets is silly. It's like going from 0 to 1 and claiming "infinite growth".

    9. Re: Got to love beancounters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And some people feel a rai drop, and then another... And then plot a trendline and run for high ground.

      This is a stupidly small data set and is indicative of nothing. (Certainly not a victory lap). You could jump back to 500 cases in a season with ease.

    10. Re: Got to love beancounters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      TFS doesn't say that. How is school relevant?

  4. Bullshit. It is not eliminated. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    It's nowhere near eliminated.
    With the massive influx of African and middle eastern immigrants to Europe, it seems a lot of them are carrying TB, Malaria etc.
    While the mosquito population is in better check, it does not mean that no one is infected. It is a blatant lie.

    1. Re:Bullshit. It is not eliminated. by Teun · · Score: 0

      Here you tell us you are a racist and xenophobe, also known as a lack of self-esteem, something that is not helpful for any positive cause.
      In the context of the article 'infected' should be read as 'getting infected' in these countries.

      But then your displayed ignorance has probably prevented you from knowing Malaria is not human to human transferable, it requires a specific kind of mosquito to spread.

      --
      "The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
    2. Re:Bullshit. It is not eliminated. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In the context of the article 'infected' should be read as 'getting infected' in these countries.

      You're right in terms of what is being measured, but the word "infected" doesn't occur in the article. The article speaks of "cases" which is ambiguous. The study says "indigenous malaria cases" though.

    3. Re:Bullshit. It is not eliminated. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I see you as the troll you are.
      I am of 100% Middle Eastern descent.
      Nowhere did I say anything which can be attributed to xenophobia. It was stating the obvious.
      It is not eliminated. Do you understand the word eliminated?
      I did not say anything about transmission either.
      A lot of infected people are arriving to Europe as a part of the general population in Malaria stricken areas.
      They are also carrying other diseases which are less common in Europe, such as TB.
      This is not racism or xenophobia. This is fact. Are you going to contend me on the fact that a lot more people in Africa and the Middle East are carrying the parasite or has more cases of TB? Or that the influx of people escaping horrible situations in their home country are more likely to carry diseases not indigenous to Europe?
      We treat them with all measures we treat all citizens. It has nothing to do with race, colour or origin. It is not eliminated. Period.

      Control of the mosquito is far better. This is true however.

    4. Re:Bullshit. It is not eliminated. by Talderas · · Score: 1

      I'm not sure how specific you are talking about but it's all females of the Anopheles genus which includes at least 35 different species. Any colored region on this map is a region in which malaria can be spread. http://www.cdc.gov/malaria/ima...

      --
      "Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
    5. Re:Bullshit. It is not eliminated. by AK+Marc · · Score: 1

      That's not how it's measured. Your ignorance knows no bounds. No new cases. Nobody getting it there means it's eliminated.

      Nobody uses your measure, because it'd make it impossible for people to seek international treatment. Something that's common, and quite safe (even with the Ebola scare in the US, that was a few people who broke protocol making the scare larger than the risk).

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    6. Re:Bullshit. It is not eliminated. by Rakarra · · Score: 1

      Here you tell us you are a racist and xenophobe, also known as a lack of self-esteem, something that is not helpful for any positive cause.

      Racist and xenophobic? Diseases have always spread through large human migrations. As TFS flat-out states, there are regions in the world where these diseases still exist, and people bring disease with them where they go. It can happen with Malaria, it certainly happened to Western Hemisphere civilizations when European colonizers arrived. It's just one of the pitfalls of migration.

  5. The title reads like something out of North Korea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    nt

  6. Tajikistan ?!?!? by Pascal+Sartoretti · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The article lists Tajikistan as a European country, which makes it difficult to consider the article seriously.

    1. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, I was wondering about that aswell, it's just clumped into the WHO "European Region", which contains other clearly European countries like Kyrgyzstan. I wonder if the region is really Europe + USSR.

      http://www.who.int/choice/demography/euro_region/en/

    2. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by a_n_d_e_r_s · · Score: 4, Informative

      Acutally it says European region. Tajikistan was a member of Sovjet but Tajikistan became free in 1991. The country selected to be part of WHO European region as before when part of Sovjet.

      So because of historical reason several old Sovjet former republics are now members of WHO European office and not the asian.

      --
      Just saying it like it are.
    3. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      None of the nine 'European' countries where malaria existed according to the report are actually in Europe.

    4. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by De_Boswachter · · Score: 5, Funny

      Moreover, Russia participates in the Eurovision Song Contest.

    5. Re: Tajikistan ?!?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Europe decides its own borders. Non-European untermensch have no say in the matter.

    6. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by Pascal+Sartoretti · · Score: 1

      Moreover, Russia participates in the Eurovision Song Contest.

      Russia can be considered as part of Europe (depending on how you define it...), but Tajikistan is definitely an Asian country.

    7. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by dave420 · · Score: 1

      So you have no idea how any of this works, and you'd rather spend your time and effort telling everyone that rather than educating yourself. Thanks for clearing that up.

    8. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by Vlad_the_Inhaler · · Score: 3, Funny

      Moreover, Russia participates in the Eurovision Song Contest.

      I heard somewhere that Australia was going to participate in the Eurovision Song Contest this year, and Israel has won the thing once so that is really not a criteria.
      Tajikistan borders on Afghanistan and China - along with some other post-Soviet states - so including it under Europe is just a tiny bit misleading. Most of Turkey is also in Asia.

      --
      Mielipiteet omiani - Opinions personal, facts suspect.
    9. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by swb · · Score: 1

      I'm pretty sure if it enhanced money making, they would include fucking Fiji in the "Eurovision" contest. And their audience knows less about geography than the show creators care about geography, as paradoxically impossible as that might seem.

    10. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Australia also participates in the Eurovision Song Contest (since last year), that's not a very good criteria.

    11. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by AK+Marc · · Score: 1

      All the former soviet republics were at one time "in Europe" for all measures, as the USSR was wholly in Europe, for UN administration. So when the pieces left the USSR, the administration stayed the same. It's all arbitrary anyway, so a little blurring of the single continent of Eurasia doesn't hurt. It's all a single landmass, so should be a single continent. And any argument I've seen that the mountains separate it into a separate continent also works to have India be a separate continent, but those people don't like that application of their arguments, so I ignore their hypocrisy.

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    12. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by RockDoctor · · Score: 1

      So, I'm told, do Australia and New Zealand. This is not a good discriminator.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
    13. Re:Tajikistan ?!?!? by sysrammer · · Score: 1

      Well, I guess that's one way to get good ratings. Might be hard to get it past the censors, though.

      --
      His ignorance covered the whole earth like a blanket, and there was hardly a hole in it anywhere. - Mark Twain
  7. cure for every disease by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    EXTERMINATE ALL HUMANS

  8. Zika by mrbill1234 · · Score: 2

    Just in time for a new virus - Zika

    1. Re:Zika by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you're traveling to a tropical region:

      Use physical barriers where you can.
      - Insect netting on your shelter
      - Insect netting on your bed
      - Appropriate clothing! Shorts and short sleeved shirts are asking for trouble!
      - If you're headed out for an extended period of time use an insect repellent treatment for your clothing. Follow the instructions if you're treating your own clothing with permethrin!

      Get yourself the best insect repellent you can, and again, follow the damned instructions!
      - If you don't know what brand to buy ask a local, but not a shop keeper!
      - My personal preference (from years in northern parts of Australia) is a 40% DEET spray.
      -- Don't spray this on your kids!
      -- DEET isn't very good against some other friendlies, like ticks.

      If you're pregnant and still have sexual partners wearing such a strong concentration of DEET, use protection.
      - Zika is also transmitted sexually :/

  9. Re: The title reads like something out of North Ko by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Agreed. I thought it sounded 1984. 1. My grandfather contracted Malaria in Germany because the Rhine valley is considerably warmer than most of the country 2. The migrants are bringing Malaria back like it ever left but oh hey let's just not report cases just like we don't report rapes either. These people are not fugitives of war or any other sort of refugee but exactly what they're called: migrants. Migrants who bring us poverty, disease, rape and islam.

  10. Medical doctors on the ground fear by Max_W · · Score: 2

    that with global warming the malaria mosquito areal will move further to the north.

    1. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by quenda · · Score: 4, Interesting

      that with global warming the malaria mosquito areal will move further to the north.

      If developed countries like Australia and Singapore are malaria-free, I don't see how a warmer Europe should have a problem.

    2. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Australia and Singapore are island nations. It's a lot easier to keep diseases like malaria out when you don't share a land border with nations that have them.

      Malaria could easily make its way through the Middle East, then up through Turkey to Bulgaria and Eastern Europe... or through Georgia, Russia, and the Ukraine to Poland. Sure, it'd take time, but it's very plausiable.

    3. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by Max_W · · Score: 1

      Add to this that there are a lot of rivers, wetland, and forests in Europe. And there are also floods. Australia has got a lot of dry territories, and Singapore is on the sea shore, where there could be a sea-breezes.

    4. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by danbob999 · · Score: 1

      Singapore isn't far enough in the sea to provide an actual protection from malaria. The reason why there is no malaria in Singapore is that it's an urban territory. Malaria doesn't affect big cities as much as rural areas.

    5. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      absolutely no proof or backing to this statement.

    6. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Especially since Singapore is constantly coating itself with poison. And it still has Dengue cases.

    7. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by Solandri · · Score: 1

      It's not just temperature which leads to more mosquitoes. Southern California has ideal temperatures for mosquito breeding, but almost no mosquitoes. The reason is the dry climate - standing water is extremely rare, meaning there's no place for mosquitoes to lay their eggs. So for mosquito growth, you need both warm temperatures and enough humidity to prevent standing water from evaporating. That's why mosquito control isn't just spraying pesticides, it's eliminating places where standing water can pool (e.g. disposed tires) for about the week mosquito larvae need to grow, and setting up honeypot pools which attract mosquitoes to lay their eggs there but which are poisoned to kill the larvae.

    8. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Singapore has a way to deal with malaria effectively (effective access to heath care) making the retransmission of malaria very unlikely, but Singapore is far from immune to mosquito-borne diseases, of great concern are dengue and chikungunya which seem to like urban settings more than malaria. Also keep in mind that these diseases changed faster that the measures to control or cure them. While an area might be free of a disease for a given time, they might reappear due to uncontrollable factors.

    9. Re:Medical doctors on the ground fear by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Southern California has ideal temperatures for mosquito breeding, but almost no mosquitoes. The reason is the dry climate - "

      I doubt this is true. Greece has California's climate and it had a major malaria problem until serious DDT spraying was done in the 1950s. I suspect the real reason for California's lack of malaria is some kind of similar public health initiative at some point in the past. (Unless you're talking about deserts. Obviously deserts are dry and have no mosquitoes.)

  11. Great, but probably won't last... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If you check out the map here:

    http://ecdc.europa.eu/en/healthtopics/vectors/vector-maps/Pages/VBORNET_maps.aspx

    You'll see that, presumably "thanks" to climate change, disease-carrying mosquito species are well-established in Southern Europe and are steadily moving north.
    For the moment, there seems to be is no critical mass to sustain infection, and thus cases of malaria, west Nile virus etc. are pretty rare and normally due to people returning from travel to endemic areas. But still, future looks worrying.

  12. think of the children! by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 1

    i've been carefully watching my own kids and they have seemed to have lost their fear of nature now that there aren't bugs carrying potentially deadly viruses. it's only a matter of time before they run into the forest to live with the animals and... wait a second... i don't have children! who are these frauds?!

    --
    Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
  13. Where will they stop ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "The WHO attributes success to improved surveillance systems, better mosquito control, and greater collaboration across borders,"

    And I thought terrorism was a sorry-ass excuse for surveillance...

  14. Both malaria and world hunger are beatable by GoodNewsJimDotCom · · Score: 1

    If we think about others more than ourselves, we should be helping defeat the two great problems of wold hunger and malaria. Every little bit we can help does help for immediate and lasting change. World hunger in itself could be defeated in a generation if enough of us helped. Even something as simple as eating your boring leftovers so you eat out and save money can help out some. The main idea is to forgo the luxuries that you don't need to help more.

    --
    God spoke to me
    1. Re:Both malaria and world hunger are beatable by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can't solve world hunger period. The problem is human greed, and I'm not talking about the wide gulf between haves/have nots, I'm talking about the scum who get in the middle of the process between food distribution and the people its intended for. They see an opportunity to gain power / wealth by being in control and as long as somebody can insert themselves as a bottleneck to the distribution process there will never be a solution.

  15. Good riddance by Jesrad · · Score: 4, Informative

    Even a passing interest in genealogy will teach any European how massively deadly malaria and influenza have been for their grandparents and great-grandparents. Malaria has killed half of every human being ever, it used to kill millions out of every generation in Europe even in the XXth century, until large-scale efforts at drying out swamps and massive DDT campaigns successfully curbed mosquito breeding to a point where the parasite couldn't spread and renew its carrier pool anymore.

    --
    Maybe we deserve this world ?
    1. Re:Good riddance by Mashiki · · Score: 1

      It's not just Europe but North America as well. Swamp drying, and pesticide use pushed it or reduced the number of locations where it could breed. Lot of people don't know that half the people who died making the Rideau(Ottawa) Canal were killed by malaria that was back in the 1800's, start digging through death records for the period and you'll start seeing stuff like "xyz person died, suspected lake fever" "swamp fever" "bad swamp/lake air" things like that with a list of symptoms that mirror malaria. Both lake and swamp fever were the common classification of malaria here in the americas before the disease was identified.

      --
      Om, nomnomnom...
    2. Re:Good riddance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Malaria has killed half of every human being ever

      AFAIK both halves of me are alive.

    3. Re:Good riddance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What about the birds then? (The swamps.)
      Also Muslims (Europe.)

    4. Re:Good riddance by StormReaver · · Score: 1

      I'm going to get modded to hell for this, but I would like to point out what was NOT a significant contributor to the eradication of Malaria: vaccinations.

      Once again, sanitation proves to the one of the largest preventers of disease.

      But I fully expect the pharmaceutical industry to release a new vaccine and claim responsibility for the eradication of Malaria, just like it did with measles, mumps, and rubella.

    5. Re:Good riddance by angel'o'sphere · · Score: 1

      First of all: I hate posts that start with "I will get modded down".
      Secondly: you are an idiot.
      Thirdly: there is no vaccination against Malaria, and there never will be.

      Perhaps morons like you should for funk sake read an wikipedia article about what Malaria actually is.

      You cant vaccinationate people against parasites, you only can against virus and bacteria!!!!! Get a damn clue.

      --
      Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
  16. Disease vs political boundaries by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The article lists Tajikistan as a European country, which makes it difficult to consider the article seriously.

    If you can't take an article about malaria seriously because of political pedantry then you're not the right person to be commenting on the topic.

    Hint: mosquitos don't stop at political boundaries.

  17. 1% indigenous malaria in 2014? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    0 cases seems remarkable given that two years ago, the ECDC said that only "99% of malaria cases [in Europe] are travel-related".

    1. Re:1% indigenous malaria in 2014? by Shimbo · · Score: 1

      0 cases seems remarkable given that two years ago, the ECDC said that only "99% of malaria cases [in Europe] are travel-related".

      Most of this was a big (relatively speaking) and anomalous spike in Greece.

        "For instance, Greece had managed to remain malaria free between 1974 and 2009, but in 2010 three locally acquired malaria cases were reported, followed by 40 in 2011, 20 in 2012 and three in 2013".

      http://www.euro.who.int/en/hea...

    2. Re:1% indigenous malaria in 2014? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Three factors could explain that anomalous spike:
      1. The arrival of large numbers of migrants, some of whom are probably carrying malaria in their blood streams.
      2. The economic crisis that has gutted the public health system.
      3. The increase in mosquito populations in certain regions due to environmental restoration initiatives.

  18. The PTB rely on HUMAN FLESH in the FOOD SUPPLY by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The PTB rely on HUMAN FLESH in the FOOD SUPPLY to maintain their human appearance!

    ##
    Human flesh exists in a lot of foods today. Sometimes it makes the news. These are PTB slip ups, and/or conditioning this reality.

    They rely on the consumption of human flesh to retain their human appearance. They all have the same scent. They exist from the bottom to the top of the pyramid. Some are bums, some are middle/upper class, some are those dancing for you on TV, in a web of deceit to keep your mind and body occupied.

    If you want to try and let one of them know that you know what they are, you might say to them:

    "This hamburger is really quite human"
    (inhale deeply) "This planet is filled with creatures which all smell the same"
    "I hope you enjoyed your flesh burger"
    "How long did your last regeneration period last?"
    "What office do you work for?"

    ### COPY PASTE THIS EVERYWHERE AS MODS DELETE IT BECAUSE THEY KNOW IT'S TRUE! ###

  19. Until the Anti Vaxxers start there.... by Lumpy · · Score: 1

    Just wait, human stupidity will fix that for you guys.

    Why cant we get a vaccine against stupidity? or at least make it so those people can not reproduce?

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    1. Re: Until the Anti Vaxxers start there.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Umm dude malaria has no practical vaccine. (Last one I heard of required manually dissecting infected mosquitoes for their malaria parasites.) Antimosquito measures did this.

    2. Re:Until the Anti Vaxxers start there.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, yeah, once it's pared down to the master race everything will be great. Heard it before.

    3. Re: Until the Anti Vaxxers start there.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That does not stop anti Vaxxers....

      They are an incredibly stupid bunch.

    4. Re:Until the Anti Vaxxers start there.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > Why cant we get a vaccine against stupidity?

      That's an EXCELLENT idea!

      Then all of the brainwashed sheeple who are hopelessly gullible and not quite intelligent to think for themselves will be stupid enough to get injected with it.

      Big pharma will fail to have a herd of brainless cheerleading cattle telling everyone else to get jabbed - and the intellectuals of this world can finally live in peace.

      Darwinism at it's finest.

  20. Re: The title reads like something out of North K by Frankzy · · Score: 1

    They are talking about indigenous cases and since malaria can't spread human to human it doesn't matter if immigrants bring it into the EU

  21. Climate change by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

    This is what climate change brings you. Completely extinct. I hope you are happy, Europe! #savemalaria #climatechange

    1. Re:Climate change by dave420 · · Score: 1

      Climate change is poised to make Europe not at all free of malaria. I hope you were attempting to make some sort of joke at your own expense...

    2. Re:Climate change by 110010001000 · · Score: 3, Funny

      I agree. A warmer climate will bring more malaria to Europe. As will a colder climate. We aren't sure if climate change means more warming or cooling, but either way it will bring more malaria. That is how climate change works.

  22. REFUGEES WELCOME by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Malaria. Soon to come back. Enjoy yourself.

    REFUGEES WELCOME

  23. Re: The title reads like something out of North by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Theyre not talking human to human, theyre talking moslem animal to human. Thats what they should be worried about.

  24. Sensible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sensible. Malaria saw all of the Muslims coming in, pooping out in the road in the noon-day sun, viciously molesting schoolgirls in swimming pools, etc., and decided it was time to go. Can't blame it.

  25. Re: The title reads like something out of North by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Did your wife/sister hook up with a brown guy and now you are bitter?

  26. Just in case... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'll continue to drink gin and tonics on a regular basis. Can't be too careful, right?

  27. Stupid vaccins... by manu144x · · Score: 1

    [sarcasm] Stupid pharmaceutical companies and their damn vaccins ruining our children! [/sarcasm]

    1. Re:Stupid vaccins... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Vaccines have nothing to do with Malaria at this point. Nice try though.

    2. Re:Stupid vaccins... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This was archived without vaccination

  28. Re: The title reads like something out of North K by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What do you mean it can't spread human to human? If you mean that coughing won't spread it, okay, but with a little help from mosquitoes it certainly does. And I'm moderately sure mosquitoes exist in Europe.

  29. In Other News by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Merck is showcasing its new Goodbye-Malaria-Forever vaccine as part of an initiative to have the Federal Government support mandatory Malaria vaccine shots for all citizens, "just in case' it appears on earth again. (Think of the children!).

    Note: All of our vaccines have been thoroughly tested (on unwitting subjects) and all side effects (most of them serious) have been omitted from the official reports and studies given to various government and regulatory bodies, in addition to bribes - aka gifts - given to important and influential personnel. Any scientists who have discovered serious problems with our miracle products have been completely discredited or assassinated for your safety.

    Please DO NOT read the fine print (it is a waste of time and far to small to see with the naked eye anyway).
     
     
    fineprint

    Side effects of Malaria vaccination (like other miracle vaccines) may (read: likely) include:

    redness, swelling, soreness, fever, upset stomach, vomiting, loss of appetite, headache, fatigue, rash, nausea, chills, Sudden Infant Death
    Syndrome, seizures, autism, Guillaine-Barre Syndrome, brain swelling, shock, anaphylaxis, cardiac arrest, ataxia, drowsiness, insomnia,
    narcolepsy, myalgia, arthralgia, urticarial, edema, upper respiratory tract infection, diarrhea, paralysis, infertility, death.

    Disclaimer: Merck and other big pharma companies are completely immune to prosecution from any adverse reactions caused by our miracle products. You cannot sue us or hold us accountable in any way whatsoever. In this respect (and many others) we are GOD. Do not question us. Just do as we say. Play ball and get your shot so we don't have to send a Vaccine Enforcement Unit (VEU) to your home and forcefully inject you.

    Thank you for your co-operation and understanding.

    Big Pharma.

    fineprint

  30. Re: The title reads like something out of North Ko by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    > Migrants who bring us poverty, disease, rape and Zionism

    Fixed that for you.

  31. The role of DDT by dlenmn · · Score: 4, Informative

    (Not picking on you in particular; it's just that you mention DDT, so this seems like a good place to post.)

    For what I can tell, this time round, Malaria was eliminated without a massive DDT campaign (possibly without DDT at all). I can't find a single source on DDT use in this campaign, but here is the summary on how Turkey eliminated malaria recently, and it looks like no DDT was used post 2000 (although it was used heavily earlier).

    For those who don't know, DDT use in controversial because it is harmful to birds (and is likely a carcinogen, but then again, what isn't a carcinogen?). However, not using it is also controversial because critics say that environmentalist trying to reduce the use of DDT are causing millions of deaths worldwide by prioritizing wildlife over human lives. FWIW, the World Health Orgainzation still supports using DDT to fight malaria, but it also strongly recommends using newer (and likely less environmentally harmful) pesticides.

    The pro-DDT critics of envromentalists often miss one big thing, which gets hammered on in the first liked I posted: a lot of mosquito have gained resistance to DDT (and other pesticides). Just like overuse of antibiotics leads to antibiotic-resistant bacteria, so does the overuse of pesticides lead to pesticide-resistant mosquito. The link makes that pretty clear:

    By 1999/2000, resistance to 12 insecticides (DDT, dieldrin, malathion, fenitrothion, pirimiphosmethyl, bendiocarb, deltamethrin, permethrin, lambdacyhalothrin, eofenprox, cyfluthrin and propoxur) was reported for specimens of An. sacharovi, in both laboratory cultures and wild-caught mosquitoes collected in the malarious areas of Adana, Adiyaman, Antalya, Aydn, and Mugla in southern Turkey. In Adana, Adiyaman and Antalya, An. sacharovi was susceptible only to malathion and pirimiphos-methyl.

    That's kind of scary. It makes it clear that we need a plan B for killing mosquitoes other than wide-spread use of pesticides, because existing pesticides are already loosing their effectiveness. New pesticides will eventually suffer the same fate too.

    1. Re:The role of DDT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Informative

      There's an additional subtlety to supporting DDT use that you're missing, namely, that "use" doesn't mean "overuse." When we attempted to ban DDT worldwide, it was in the context of seeing the environmental effects of dumping a ton of it on every arable acre. It's as if we had never gotten to the red wine studies about a glass a day being good for you because we saw that a case a day was destructive.

      Plus, it's all nice for US environmentalists to continue to support its ban when our malaria is already gone.

      Also, Turkey and India were one of the few places someone I knew interested in the liver-cancer-protective properties of DDT could get some, so I doubt there's any resistance in the insect population to DDT elsewhere.

    2. Re:The role of DDT by LWATCDR · · Score: 2

      Except that DDT was used all over Europe from 1945 until the 1970s and with that you saw a large decrease in Malaria.
      Eliminating Malaria didn't start over last week but has been an ongoing task that really got started after WWII.
      It is often said that WWII was the first war where more people were killed by weapons than starvation and disease. I do not know now if that is true or not but it was probably the first war where the victors made such a large effort to keep the civilians of the nations that lost alive and healthy.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    3. Re:The role of DDT by RockDoctor · · Score: 1

      DDT use in controversial because it is harmful to birds

      DDT use and manufacture has been banned because it is a "bioaccumulator" (it increases in concentration in predators which eat insects containing sub-lethal doses of it, and increases further in predators which eat those predators ...) ; one effect of this was severe damage to bird populations - particularly raptors.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
    4. Re:The role of DDT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think you are all so NAIVE!!! Not to say in-basil. You are trusting too many people in untrustworthy areas and languages, then disable our insecticides because they no longer function according to their base data.

  32. Windows 95 is what done it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Without that it would have been OS/2, and IBM wouldn't give a shit about eradicating malaria. It only cares about the bottom line, and bugs ain't part of that.

  33. Great! by OpinOnion · · Score: -1

    How much did it cost and what guarantees do we have it won't come back again?

    1. Re:Great! by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 1

      We received a postcard from Malaria that said something along the lines of "Fine, be that way! We're leaving for good!"

  34. Better safe than sorry by Atrox666 · · Score: 2

    I'll keep drinking my gin and tonic just in case.

    1. Re:Better safe than sorry by sjames · · Score: 1

      Hear Hear! To our health!

  35. The Who by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 1

    The Who attributes success to improved surveillance systems, better mosquito control, and greater collaboration across borders, and wants everyone to know that their next show will be on april 27th in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at the Air Canada Centre.

  36. Mosquitoes by NewYork · · Score: 1

    Mosquitoes should have been eliminated

    --
    Casteism