Malaria transmission in Africa: Its relationship with yellow fever and measles

Abstract

Background Malaria has been strongly linked to the transmission and pathophysiology of some viral diseases. Malaria and vaccine-preventable diseases often co-exist in endemic countries but the implication of their co-existence on their transmission dynamics and control is poorly understood. The study aims to evaluate the relationships between the incidence of malaria and cases of measles and yellow fever in Africa. Methods The malaria incidence, death due to malaria, measles and yellow fever data were sourced from the WHO database. Poisson and zero-inflated time-trend regression were used to model the relationships between malaria and the two vaccine-preventable diseases. P-values <0.05 were considered statistically significant. Results A significant negative relationship existed between malaria incidence and measles cases (P<0.05), however, malaria showed a positive relationship with yellow fever (P<0.05). The relationships between death due to malaria and measles/yellow fever cases followed similar trends but with a higher level of statistical significance (P<0.001). Conclusions Malaria varied negatively with measles cases but positively with yellow fever. The relationships observed in this study could be important for the management of malaria and the studied vaccine-preventable diseases. Increase vaccination coverage and/or malaria treatment could modulate the direction of these relationships.

A proposed One Health approach to control yellow fever outbreaks in Uganda

“…Projection model indicated, with 93.0% certainty (95% confidence interval: 92.7-93.2%) that YF mortality in Africa is expected to increase significantly by 2050. due to climate change [36]. Another environmental factor is the malaria mosquito control programs that also impact other breeds of mosquitoes [37]. This suggests that public health measures used to control mosquito-causing malaria (e.g., widespread deployment of insecticidetreated bed nets) could impact the occurrence of YF and vice versa [37,38] More specially, Uganda is experiencing a steady rise in temperature and variabilities in rain fall pattern.…”

“…Another environmental factor is the malaria mosquito control programs that also impact other breeds of mosquitoes [37]. This suggests that public health measures used to control mosquito-causing malaria (e.g., widespread deployment of insecticidetreated bed nets) could impact the occurrence of YF and vice versa [37,38] More specially, Uganda is experiencing a steady rise in temperature and variabilities in rain fall pattern. More rainfalls are observed during the dry season.…”

Epidemiology of yellow fever virus in humans, arthropods, and non-human primates in sub-Saharan Africa: A systematic review and meta-analysis

“…It should also be noted that African population is more at risk of contracting the yellow fever virus and of developing severe forms and death due to a low rate of vaccination coverage and daily activities that bring them closer to vectors such as agriculture, livestock, hunting, and deforestation [77][78][79][80]. Also, the existence in Africa of other health conditions such as malnutrition, tuberculosis, malaria and, HIV are other factors that could be associated with this high of YFV CFR [81][82][83]. About 1/5 th (18.8%) of sampled human participants included in this review had IgG antibodies against YFV (past infection).…”

The Defensive Interactions of Prominent Infectious Protozoan Parasites: The Host’s Complement System

“…Plasmodium spp. belong to the apicomplexan parasites with a complex life cycle involving two hosts, an invertebrate, the Anopheles mosquito acting as its biological vector and a vertebrate, such as humans [ 19 , 20 ]. It has been found that the complement is involved in all life cycle-stages of the Plasmodium parasites, including the pre-erythrocytic-, erythrocytic-, and sexual-stages during immunity against malaria [ 7 , 21 , 22 ].…”