Malaria Epidemiology and Control Within the International Centers of Excellence for Malaria Research

Abstract

Understanding the epidemiological features and metrics of malaria in endemic populations is a key component to monitoring and quantifying the impact of current and past control efforts to inform future ones. The International Centers of Excellence for Malaria Research (ICEMR) has the opportunity to evaluate the impact of malaria control interventions across endemic regions that differ in the dominant Plasmodium species, mosquito vector species, resistance to antimalarial drugs and human genetic variants thought to confer protection from infection and clinical manifestations of plasmodia infection. ICEMR programs are conducting field studies at multiple sites with the aim of generating standardized surveillance data to improve the understanding of malaria transmission and to monitor and evaluate the impact of interventions to inform malaria control and elimination programs. In addition, these epidemiological studies provide a vast source of biological samples linked to clinical and environmental “meta-data” to support translational studies of interactions between the parasite, human host, and mosquito vector. Importantly, epidemiological studies at the ICEMR field sites are integrated with entomological studies, including the measurement of the entomological inoculation rate, human biting index, and insecticide resistance, as well as studies of parasite genetic diversity and antimalarial drug resistance.

Epidemiology of Plasmodium vivax Malaria in Peru

“…Despite the increasing research conducted in Peru over the past decade on P. vivax malaria epidemiology,17–21 diagnostics,22,23 treatment,12,13,24 vector biology,25–28 and molecular genetics,29–31 several knowledge gaps still need to be addressed to support the Peruvian NMCP, so that malaria transmission hotspots can be readily identified and that the NMCP can more effectively implement strategies that target such areas with effective interventions 32. In this review, the trends in P. vivax incidence are described in relation to major control efforts implemented in Peru over the past 70 years.…”

Prevalence of Chagas Disease in a U.S. Population of Latin American Immigrants with Conduction Abnormalities on Electrocardiogram

“…However, because up to 99% of people with CD are undiagnosed and T . cruzi infection is not routinely screened in the U.S. outside of blood banks,[6] it is likely many at-risk patients who present with ECG abnormalities within the medical system have not had a prior test for CD. When patients from endemic countries show ECG abnormalities characteristic of CD, it is essential to ensure they have been tested for T .…”

“…[1] Between 2007 and 2013, 1908 cases of CD were identified in the blood donation system. [6] In a study of blood samples in Los Angeles, 1 in 1,993 were positive for T . cruzi antibodies.…”

“…[7] Nonetheless, an overwhelming majority of CD patients in the US are undiagnosed and untreated. [6, 8]…”

Improving the efficiency of reactive case detection for malaria elimination in southern Zambia: a cross-sectional study

“…Studies have shown that environmental risk factors can be used to identify households likely to have parasitaemic residents [19,[20][21][22][23][24]; however, the use of such environmental risk factors have not been explored in southern Zambia in the context of RCD. Building on prior work that assessed the efficiency of RCD in southern Zambia, the predictive ability of environmental risk factors was evaluated at varied spatial scales to identify parasitaemic residents of households located within a larger radius of 250 metres from an index household [18,25,26].…”