Reliable Intel in the War on Malaria.(estimating cases of Malaria)

Byline: R. M. Schneiderman

Ever since the World Health Organization abandoned its goal of eradicating malaria in 1969, health-care workers have watched in alarm as the mosquito-born parasite Plasmodium falciparum has continued to spread, and millions of people have been forced to live with chronic malaria. Several WHO studies have concluded that, aside from the human suffering, the parasite exacts a heavy economic toll as well, trimming between 1 and 2 percent off Africa's GDP each year.

Last week a study in the journal Nature concluded that the problem has become far worse than the WHO and other health organizations had thought. Bob Snow, a professor of tropical public health, and his colleagues at the Kenyan Medical Research Institute and Oxford University found that there were 515 million cases of malaria in Africa in 2002--50 percent more than the WHO had estimated. In Southeast Asia, he found, 119 million people suffered from malaria in 2002--three times more than the WHO had estimated.

Why the discrepancy? Whereas WHO scientists relied mostly on government statistics to compile the number of malaria cases, Snow's team used ...