Core Chemistry

Gabe Morato

Current Event 2

February 22, 2015

Malaria in Widening Area Resists Drug, Study Finds

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/20/world/asia/malaria-drug-artemisinin-is-failing-across-wider-area-study-warns.html?ref=science

Fuller, Thomas. "Malaria in Widening Area Resists Drug, Study Finds." The New York Times. The New York Times, 19 Feb. 2015. Web. 20 Feb. 2015.

The article I read called, Malaria in Widening Area Resists Drug, Study Finds, by: Thomas Fuller, is a very interesting article about how malaria in some places is resisting the drug used to treat it. The study in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, a medical journal, raises the troubling idea that resistance to the drug, artemisinin, might one day severely damage the treatment of malaria, which kills hundreds of thousands of people every year. In the article, Charles Woodrow says that this issue should “focus people,” and, “We have to eliminate these very resistant parasites. The fear is that if we don’t, we would reverse all the gains that have been made” (Paragraph 3). The article goes on to explain that this problem was brought up about a decade ago. It says, “Early signs of trouble with the drug were cited a decade ago by scientists working in western Cambodia. Falciparum malaria, the deadliest form of the disease, was increasingly resistant to treatment with artemisinin,” (Paragraph 5). But, the authors of the study do not know if it is actually becoming resistant, or if our new technology has revealed a situation that had gone undetected. The authors of the study also wrote, “The pace at which the geographical extent of artemisinin resistance is spreading is faster than the rate at which control and elimination measures are being developed and instituted, or new drugs being introduced” (Paragraph 10). The article also states that there is no replacement drug for artemisinin, which makes this resistant strain of malaria particularly dangerous. Fuller also tells us that the resistant strain began in Cambodia, but it has traveled thousands of miles to Myanmar and India. Finally, Fuller states that, “Researchers’ great fear is that resistance to artemisinin will spread to Africa. Ninety percent of the estimated 584,000 annual deaths from malaria occur in Africa, according to the World Health Organization” (paragraph 20).

This article definitely brings forth a issue that can affect our society. Already, almost 600,000 people die every year from malaria, even with artemisinin. If this resistance spreads, the mortality rate would be tremendously higher. It would also take years for doctors to develop another drug that would treat malaria. Also, this resistant malaria has big effects on economies across the world, since many governments are investing in more research and facilities in malaria-ridden countries. I chose this article for many reasons. First, I found the title intriguing, since I thought malaria was treatable. Also, I am interested in medicine, and I wanted to learn more about this type of malaria.

Overall, I thought this article was very well written, but it did have some minor issues. The author did a good job of giving background of the situation, and he started of generally and got more specific. Also, I liked how he broke his information into concise paragraph, like an editorial would. One thing I did not like is that he did not have many outside opinions, only Charles Woodrow and Dr. Voravit. In addition, I would suggest he explains why the malaria is resistant on the chemical level, and why malaria is so dangerous, for readers that are not as familiar with this issue.