Something I’ve been curiuos about for years for years is that when living in the tropics for 6 years (In coastal Papua New Guinea) every member of my family had malaria at least once, my brother and father multiple times, except for me.
I never took any quinine tablets except when we first got there and almost never wore mosquito repellent.
Am I just very lucky or is it possible I have a much more effective immune system than the rest of my family?
Believe it or not, but people who suffer from sickle cell anemia are immune to malaria. That’s how it developed in the first place and who it most commonly affects people of african descent. In order to have sickle cell anemia, a person must be homozygous for the trait (ie: both parents must carry the trait). However, someone who is heterozgous for the trait (someone who is a carrier, but does not actually have sickle cell anemia) has increased resistance to malarial infection.
So, unless you are a carrier for malaria, my WAG is that you were just lucky.
I’m kind of jealous. I’ve always wanted to get malaria once. Just think of the great stories I could tell people! “That reminds me of the time I had malaria…”
D’OH! Last post should’ve said “carrier for sickle cell anemia” :smack:
Don’t forget the Duffy antigens, too. FYa and Fyb are proteins involved in P. vivax infections, so Africans who are more likely to be Fya- and Fya- are immune to malaria. I can’t find anything offhand about whether being only Fya or Fyb + affords any protection or resistance.
Vlad/Igor
Sickle trait individuals are not immune to malaria!! They are more resistant to it than others, and they are more likely to survive the infection. But they still can and do get malaria, and can die from it.
People with two genes for hemoglobin C are invulnerable to malaria, and it does appear that Duffy-null individuals are also immune, as vlad/igor already pointed out.
Oops, sorry, Nunavit boy! You are correct and I misread you. My bad. In my cursory reading of your post, I thought you said sickle trait people were immune, but you didn’t say that at all. You are quite correct in saying that sicklers are immune, and sickle trait types have increased resistance.
Sorry 'bout that.
It’s not as exciting as you would think. I grew up in what was then Zaire, Africa and have had malaria more times than I can count, despite being on cloriquin the entire time. When I tell people that, they don’t seem that stoked. Plus, a bad case of malaria really, really sucks.
Very true. However, it’s still better than having sickle cell disease.
Yeah they thought I had malaria when I was in Malawi. i felt like death chilled, then they gave me the Fansidar. Oh god I’ve never been sicker from medicine in my life! Apparently thats because I didnt have malaria and I was lucky my liver didnt turn to a puddle of goo or some other horrible side effect of taking fansidar without actually having malaria.
I’ve had several friends who have been to africa and who have gotten themselves a little malaria. One was telling me that one of the first symptoms is tightness in the quadriceps. Apparently so common that there are jokes about it. What’s up with that?
Also, the last post reminded me of a question i’ve had about anti-malarials. I’ve heard that they are so toxic that they can cause kidney, liver and hearing damage (IIRC). So, is it a good idea to be taking these drugs prophylactically? I understand that a prophylactic dose would probably be much lower than a ‘treat the disease’ dose, but would it be a good idea to just hope you don’t get malaria, then if you do start a regimen to get rid of it? Like, what if I move somewhere with the intent on staying ten years? Is it smart to take antimalarials prophylactically for 10 years?