Everything you ever wanted to know about Malaria and the PC..and didn't know who to ask.

Hmmm..well, Peace Corps lecture us from Day One on the importance of taking our scheduled Malaria PROPYHLAXIS on a regular basis and even after we leave Ghana for a few weeks.

The one I take, and that was prescribed for me by the PC medical staff here, is Mefloquine and so I have a running entry in all my diaries for 'Malaria Friday'....and every Friday, without fail, i take my meds and mark it off in the diaries.

It isn't guaranteed that i won't get malaria but my chances of avoidance are much improved. Good.

But here's the catch...Prophylaxis is prevention of a disease or infection..but Mefloquine doesn't prevent malaria.

It does NOT act to prevent or stop initial malarial infection, rather it acts later, once one has been infected by the pesky Anopheles Mosquito, on the parasites that infect erythrocytes once they have been released from their initial maturation phase in the liver!

So, we are now blithely informed that our Mefloquine Prophylaxis is in fact a suppressive treatment..once you've got early-stage malaria. And the pill acts to prevent the infection from getting out of hand (a 5% parasite level in one's bloodstream) and perhaps (1 in 5 chance) of being fatal if not correctly and quickly treated.

So in other words, during the mosquito season..almost all year here... and notwithstanding our diligence in always sleeping under a mosquito net, our rural locations and (mostly) healthy outdoor lives are such that we have a starter-level of malaria in our bloodstream all the time!

Comforting, isn't it.

Might well explain lots of things..since flu-like symptoms and stomach..errr....disorders are early malaria symptoms..and that about sums up how most of us feel here most of the time.

Ah well, all part of 'the toughest job you'll ever love' definition, i suppose!