Malaria

[HughR]

To anyone:

Do you use malarial prophylaxis in Central America?

[Ocean Girl]

Well when I was down there the preventative was also the treatment, so no, I did not take preventative meds. Where are you going?

From the Mayo Clinic
"The history of antimalarial medicine has been marked by a constant struggle between evolving drug-resistant parasites and the search for new drug formulations. In many parts of the world, for instance, resistance to chloroquine has rendered the drug ineffective."

As it happens, a group of cruisers were hit by a form of Malaria while up the Rio Dulce. Not a bad enough strain to kill us, but took months to fully recover. There were I think seven to nine of us, we had taken a trip up river and swam into some caves, trekked through jungle, and streams.

[HughR]

We'll be going down the Central American west coast from San Diego to the Galapagos over the course of 4-6 months, so we'll be stopping in most or all of the intervening countries.

The CDC says the risk along most of the route is pretty low, except in "rural, low-altitude areas", which sounds like a lot of places cruisers go.

[colemj]

Malaria or Dengue? There has been some Dengue there this year.

Mark

[Ocean Girl]

WHO link to Antimalarial drugs
WHO | Country antimalarial drug policies: by region

[HughR]

There's nothing you can do to prevent Dengue but avoid getting bitten by mosquitos and hope

[Paul L]

We sailed down the west coast of CA in 2011/12. My wife works in Frica often and is very malaria concisous. She uses malaria meds in some plaves in Africa. The only thing we did in CA was use screens, bug juice and try to avoid particularly mosquito times and places. It was not very buggy in most places, even anchored up rivers.
Enjoy the trip.

[jim_thomsen]

We have spent the last three seasons in areas with malaria (Vanuatu and now we are in Papua New Guinea) and have decided against using any malarial prophylaxis. Maybe we would have decided to if it was a couple of weeks holiday, but taking them for 6-8 months, with the many side effects, seemed extreme.
We are reasonably careful, using bug juice when on land in the evening, trying to be back onboard before dark (we don't seem to be successful with this), having good netting on all hatches.
We do carry malaria testing kits (about $5 each) and a couple of different drugs to cure malaria (easy and cheap to buy in malaria areas.)

[belizesailor]

I live on the Rio Dulce and cruise and travel all over Central America. I dont take anti malaria drugs because the most common strain of malaria here is relatively mild and easily treatable. And, anti malaria drugs are tough on your body. Plus I live here so would have to be on them full time...almost certainly worse for you than milder forms of malaria. If visiting a region where nastier strains were commom I would certainly consider them.

Dengue concerns me more here. The hemmoragic strain can kill you.

[Crimea Cruiser]

Originally Posted by belizesailor

I live on the Rio Dulce and cruise and travel all over Central America. I dont take anti malaria drugs because the most common strain of malaria here is relatively mild and easily treatable. And, anti malaria drugs are tough on your body. Plus I live here so would have to be on them full time...almost certainly worse for you than milder forms of malaria. If visiting a region where nastier strains were commom I would certainly consider them.

Dengue concerns me more here. The hemmoragic strain can kill you.

Agreed. The strains in Central America and South America are not as strong as other regions in world, but can still make for an uncomfortable couple weeks of recovery. A preventive med is pretty much useless as the malaria virus can replicate thousands of times faster than any med designed to prevent. Different strains can exist as close as different sides of a river system.
I have done exhaustive research in Malaria. There is a good book I recommend called Exotic Viral Diseases of the World. There are much more dangerous virals out there, but that does not mean you should ignore the possibility of malaria. The risk of malaria complications is far greater in children and those with prior immunity issues. It is one of the leading causes of death in infants in some places in world. The best defense is proper netting and carry proper meds for cure. Presently the plant artemisinin is the leading drug, reverting back to ancient Chinese medicine practices as most of the new meds are already non-effective.

[GordMay]

Scientists have engineered a mosquito strain with malaria-blocking genes, which could spread through whole population in one season (99 per cent in 10 generations).

"... We do not propose that this strategy alone will eradicate malaria," University of California-Irvine molecular biologist Anthony James said.
But in conjunction with treatment and preventive drugs, future vaccines, mosquito-blocking bed nets and eradication of mosquito-breeding sites, it could play a major role in sustaining the elimination of malaria ...”

➥ http://www.nature.com/news/gene-driv...alaria-1.18858

➥ Highly efficient Cas9-mediated gene drive for population modification of the malaria vector mosquito Anopheles stephensi

[boatman61]

Seem to remember a hastily buried article in 81about US scientists messing around with the immune system of mosquitos in Africa back around 79-81.. in an attempt to erdicate Malaria..
AID's erupted in Africa around the same time .. though the popular claim is that it was created by Gays anyone with a grain of common sense would remember that men have been shagging each other for millenia without this virus raising its head before.
😂😂😂

[zeehag]

malaria will not be your problem however we do have chikungmunga(sp) and dengue. as there are no preventatives for either one as yet, it is a great idea to install screens to all opening areas and cowl vents to prevent skeeters from entering your boat.
also use a good repellent. not a bad one like skin so soft, which i have seen these skeeters enjoy as desert.
skeeter nets also work
autan used to work well enough, but......
keep no standing water on boat.
make sure bilges have some kind of preventative to keep skeeeters away from making babies in there..... spray when able the enclosure you have made for the cockpit.
i use citronella oil as a wood oil. works to keep cockpit free of skeeters. also the plug in plaquettes work, and bring many tennis raquet skeeter and no seeums zappers. they do work, and are fun to hear the bugs pop after you have been itchy for a day or two.....
since patricia, we have had outbreaks of chikinumunga(sp) disease. seems entire puebla of colimilla has contracted this. dengue in barra de navidad, and "chikin disease" in colimilla, but no malaria.
("chikin disease" has nothing to do with chickens).

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Seem to remember a hastily buried article in 81about US scientists messing around with the immune system of mosquitos in Africa back around 79-81.. in an attempt to erdicate Malaria..
AID's erupted in Africa around the same time .. though the popular claim is that it was created by Gays anyone with a grain of common sense would remember that men have been shagging each other for millenia without this virus raising its head before.
😂😂😂

Scientists identified a type of chimpanzee in West Africa as the source of HIV infection in humans. They believe that the chimpanzee version of the immunodeficiency virus (called simian immunodeficiency virus or SIV) most likely was transmitted to humans and mutated into HIV when humans hunted these chimpanzees for meat and came into contact with their infected blood. Over decades, the virus slowly spread across Africa and later into other parts of the world.

The earliest known case of infection with HIV-1 in a human was detected in a blood sample collected in 1959 from a man in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo. (How he became infected is not known.) Genetic analysis of this blood sample suggested that HIV-1 may have stemmed from a single virus in the late 1940s or early 1950s; although it has been suggested that the first case may actually have occurred in the 1930s.

Edward Hooper claimed that HIV originated as a product of cross-contamination from an oral polio vaccine administered in Africa in the late 1950s. The vaccine, called “Chat,” was claimed to be derived from chimp kidney cells and was thought to be contaminated with SIV. The vaccine was given to roughly a million people in the Belgian Congo, Rwanda, and Burundi.

On the surface, Hooper's claim seemed to have merit, because the oldest known case of AIDS occurred in a man from Kinshasha near the mouth of the Congo River. His blood was drawn in 1959 and tested positive for HIV. However, the Wistar Institute in Philadelphia, which developed the polio vaccine, came across an old vial containing the original vaccine. After careful analysis, it was proven that the vaccine contained neither HIV nor SIV. In addition, they confirmed that only macaque monkey kidney cells, which cannot be infected with SIV or HIV, were used to make the Chat vaccine.

[a64pilot]

Mosquito borne diseases can be almost completely eradicated and could be done so with less money than is now being spent.
It can and has been done with Ag planes (crop dusters) in many places, political will just isn't there, literally millions of lives of children per year could be saved, maybe so many they would starve, I don't know, but you can almost eliminate Malaria now.