30.07.2012
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Announcements / Press Releases
Dr Fatoumata Nafo-Traoré Takes Office as RBM Executive Director [RBM] — (English)
A few days after having taken up the post of Executive Director of the Roll Back Malaria Partnership, Dr Fatoumata Nafo-Traoré congratulated RBM partners for having galvanised unprecedented progress in the fight against malaria over the past decade...
RBM SARN Annual Constituencies Consultative Meeting [RBM] — (English)
The Southern Africa Roll Back Malaria Network (SARN), supported by the RBM Secretariat and partners, hold the SARN General Assembly Annual Constituencies Consultative Meeting to review progress in the implementation of the SARN Work Plan and country road maps...
Good news greets WHO malaria head on visit to Papua New Guinea [WIPRO News Release] — (English)
Dr Robert Newman, WHO's Director of the Global Malaria Programme, took in his first WHO Regional Office for the Western Pacific country malaria programme when he made a six-day visit to Papua New Guinea earlier this month...
MSF Emergency Teams Treat Nearly 40,000 for Malaria in DRC's Katanga Province [MSF] — (English)
After a four-month intervention during which Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) treated nearly 40,000 malaria patients, MSF has handed over its emergency malaria project in Kinkondja—a remote area in the Katanga province of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)—to the Congolese Ministry of Health (MoH)...
Global Fund welcomes message of support from French President François Hollande [The Global Fund Announcement] — (English)
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria welcomes a message of support delivered by President François Hollande of France at the International AIDS Conference in Washington D.C....
Global Fund Recognizes Signal of Deep Commitment by Spain [The Global Fund News release] — (English)
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria today welcomed an announcement by Spain’s Ministry of Foreign Relations and Cooperation that it will contribute €10 million (around US$ 12.1 million) to the Global Fund, a resumption of funding that signals Spain’s deep commitment to disease prevention and treatment...
A New Counterfeit Problem: Anti-Malaria Drugs [Boston University] — (English)
If successful, Zaman, an associate professor at the College of Engineering, would help address a lethal conundrum bedeviling the developing world: malaria kills an estimated one million people annually in tropical and subtropical regions, but one-third of the antimalarial drugs in a recent National Institutes of Health (NIH) review were found to be ineffective against the mosquito-borne illness...
Making a difference: TDR strategic plan 2012-2017 [TDR] — (English)
This is an overview of the 2012-2017 strategy for TDR. It includes new mission and vision statements, impact goals, guiding principles, methods of establishing work priorities, and summarizes the organizational structure to conduct this work...
DNDi e-news [DNDi] — (English)
July issue...
Centres for Disease Control (CDC): Research Entomologist Position in Haiti [CDC] — (English)
Application deadline: 9 August 2012...
WHO WPRO: Medical Officer (Malaria, and other Vectorborne and Parasitic Diseases) [WPRO] — (English)
Application deadline: 27 August 2012...
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Articles requiring subscription or registration
Effect of intermittent preventive treatment for malaria during infancy on serological responses to measles and other vaccines used in the Expanded Programme on Immunization: results from five randomised controlled trials [The Lancet, Early Online Publication, 30 July 2012 doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(12)60775-2] — (English)IPTi with sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine does not affect serological responses to EPI vaccines. This analysis, therefore, supports the WHO recommendation for coadministration of IPTi with sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine to infants at the time of the second and third doses of DTP and measles vaccination, in areas of sub-Saharan Africa with moderate to high malaria transmission and where malaria parasites are sensitive to these drugs. It also suggests that treatment of clinical malaria at or around the time of vaccination does not compromise vaccine responsiveness...
Does IPTi decrease malaria morbidity but not mortality? [The Lancet, Early Online Publication, 30 July 2012 doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(12)61184-2] — (English)
Health interventions that affect the immune system, such as vaccines, micronutrients, and drugs, can interact. With increasing focus on copackaging of child health interventions to attain Millennium Development Goal 4 (MDG4) on child mortality, potential interactions between different health interventions need to be tested. Jane Crawley and colleagues should therefore be congratulated for testing whether adding intermittent preventive treatment against malaria in infancy (IPTi)...
Overdiagnosis and mistreatment of malaria among febrile patients at primary healthcare level in Afghanistan: observational study [BMJ 2012; 345 doi: 10.1136/bmj.e4389] — (English)
Despite a much lower incidence of malaria in Afghanistan than in Africa, fever was substantially misdiagnosed as malaria in this south Asian setting. Inaccuracy was attributable to false positive laboratory diagnoses of malaria and the clinicians’ disregard of negative slide results. Rare but potentially fatal cases of falciparum malaria were not detected, emphasising the potential role of rapid diagnostic tests. Microscopy increased the proportion of patients treated with antibiotics producing a trade-off between overtreatment with malaria drugs and probable overtreatment with antibiotics...
Parasite immunity: γδ T cells boost DC responses to malaria [Nature Reviews Immunology 12, 551 (August 2012) doi:10.1038/nri3273] — (English)
Previous studies have shown that γδ T cells promote protective immunity to malaria, but the mechanisms involved were not clearly understood. This study shows that γδ T cells are important for dendritic cell (DC) activation during infection with Plasmodium berghei, a non-lethal malarial parasite...
Infectious disease: Pathogenesis of cerebral malaria—a step forward [Nature Reviews Neurology, doi:10.1038/nrneurol.2012.144] — (English)
Malaria is a devastating disease that is responsible for approximately one million deaths every year.1 Plasmodium falciparum is the malarial parasite species that causes the most-severe complications, including cerebral malaria, acute kidney injury, respiratory distress, and severe anaemia...
Sequence-based association and selection scans identify drug resistance loci in the Plasmodium falciparum malaria parasite [PNAS 10.1073/pnas.1210585109] — (English)
Based on the success of the analysis presented in this study, and on the demonstrated shortcomings of array-based approaches, we argue for a complete transition to sequence-based GWAS for small, low linkage-disequilibrium genomes like that of P. falciparum...
Enhancement of dendritic cell activation via CD40 ligand-expressing γδ T cells is responsible for protective immunity to Plasmodium parasites [PNAS July 24, 2012 vol. 109 no. 30 12129-12134 doi: 10.1073/pnas.1204480109 ] — (English)
This study improves our understanding of protective immunity against malaria and provides insights into γδ T-cell–mediated protective immunity against various infectious diseases...
Maternal Anemia at First Antenatal Visit: Prevalence and Risk Factors in a Malaria-Endemic Area in Benin [Am J Trop Med Hyg 2012 11-0706 doi: 10.4269/ajtmh.2012.11-0706] — (English)
Most anemia was caused by factors that could be prevented by available tools, stressing the need to reinforce their implementation and to evaluate their effectiveness throughout the course of the pregnancy...
No Association of Phenotypic ABO Blood Group and Malaria during Pregnancy [ Am J Trop Med Hyg 2012 12-0129 doi: 10.4269/ajtmh.2012.12-0129] — (English)
In a few small studies an association between blood group O and placental malaria has been described. The relationship between blood group and malaria in pregnancy (Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium falciparum) was analyzed in 1,468 women from three longitudinal cohort studies in which weekly malaria screening was done systematically during pregnancy. One-third of women (447 of 1,468) had at least one malaria infection in pregnancy. The ABO blood group phenotype was not associated with the species of infection, frequency of malaria attacks, symptoms of malaria, hematocrit, or parasitemia during pregnancy...
Predictors of Plasmodium falciparum Malaria Incidence in Chano Mille, South Ethiopia: A Longitudinal Study [ Am J Trop Med Hyg 2012 12-0155 10.4269/ajtmh.2012.12-0155] — (English)
We assessed potential effects of local meteorological and environmental conditions, indoor residual spray with insecticides, insecticide-treated nets (ITNs) use at individual and community levels, and individual factors on Plasmodium falciparum malaria incidence in a village in south Ethiopia...
Pre-Erythrocytic–Stage Antigen Discovery: Exploiting Naturally Acquired Humoral Responses [ Am J Trop Med Hyg 2012 12-0222 doi: 10.4269/ajtmh.2012.12-0222] — (English)
This technology has promising implications in the discovery of potential vaccine candidates against P. vivax malaria...
Community Sleeping Pattern and Anopheline Biting in Southeastern Iran: A Country Earmarked for Malaria Elimination [ Am J Trop Med Hyg 2012 11-0356 doi: 10.4269/ajtmh.2012.11-0356] — (English)
The results of present study indicated that synchronization of encounters between inhabitants and mosquito vectors was caused by poor self-protection and sleeping behavior of inhabitants. In addition, diversity in culture and behavior of the two communities may cause the prevalence of malaria to be different between them...
Artesunate for Severe Acute Plasmodium falciparum Infection in a Patient with Myasthenia Gravis [Am J Trop Med Hyg 2012 12-0114 doi: 10.4269/ajtmh.2012.12-0114 ] — (English)
We report a case of severe malaria in a patient with underlying myasthenia gravis who was successfully treated with artesunate. The outcome was favorable. Artesunate seems to be a good option for patients with underlying myasthenia gravis ease because they benefit from a better toxicity profile than quinine...
Enhanced Basophil Reactivities during Severe Malaria and Their Relationship with the Plasmodium falciparum Histamine-Releasing Factor Translationally Controlled Tumor Protein [Infect. Immun. August 2012 vol. 80 no. 8 2963-2970 doi: 10.1128/IAI.00072-12 ] — (English)
Our results show an association between basophil reactivity and malaria severity and suggest a pathogenic role for plasmodial PfTCTP in the induction of this allergy-like mechanism...
Cytometric quantification of singlet oxygen in the human malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum [Cytometry Part A Volume 81A, Issue 8, pages 698–703, August 2012] — (English)
The malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum proliferates within human erythrocytes and is thereby exposed to a variety of reactive oxygen species (ROS) such as hydrogen peroxide, hydroxyl radical, superoxide anion, and highly reactive singlet oxygen...
Genomic Sequencing of Plasmodium falciparum Malaria Parasites from Senegal Reveals the Demographic History of the Population [ Mol Biol Evol (2012) doi: 10.1093/molbev/mss161 ] — (English)
Using inferred demographic history as a null model for coalescent simulation, we identified candidate genes under selection, including genes identified before, such as pfcrt and PfAMA1, as well as new candidate genes. Interestingly, we also found selection against G/C to A/T changes that offsets the large mutational bias toward A/T, and two unusual patterns: similar synonymous and nonsynonymous allele-frequency spectra, and 18% of genes having a nonsynonymous-to-synonymous polymorphism ratio >>1...
Cutting Edge: Clec9A+ Dendritic Cells Mediate the Development of Experimental Cerebral Malaria [The Journal of Immunology August 1, 2012 vol. 189 no. 3 1128-1132 ] — (English)
Plasmodium infections trigger strong innate and acquired immune responses, which can lead to severe complications, including the most feared and often fatal cerebral malaria (CM)...
Reduced systemic bicyclo-prostaglandin-E2 and cyclooxygenase-2 gene expression are associated with inefficient erythropoiesis and enhanced uptake of monocytic hemozoin in children with severe malarial anemia†> [American Journal of Hematology Volume 87, Issue 8, pages 782–789, August 2012] — (English)
Results presented here support a model in which reduced COX-2-derived PGE2, driven in part by naturally acquired PfHz by monocytes, promotes decreased erythropoietic responses in children with SMA...
Differential acquisition of human antibody responses to Plasmodium falciparum according to intensity of exposure to Anopheles bites [Transactions of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, Volume 106, Issue 8, August 2012, Pages 460–467] — (English)
The impact of mosquito saliva on the regulation of specific protective immunity may need to be taken into account in epidemiological studies and trials for malaria vaccines...
Source of Homologous Parasites in Recurrent Plasmodium vivax Malaria [ J Infect Dis. (2012) 206 (4): 622-623. doi: 10.1093/infdis/jis393] — (English)
Letter to the editor...