November 15, 202410:27 AM ET
A technician at a Chinese pharmaceutical company works on breeding the plant sweet wormwood, used in creating artemisinin, the go-to medicine for killing the malaria parasite.
Huang Xiaobang/Xinhua via Getty Images
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Huang Xiaobang/Xinhua via Getty Images
Lately, Dr. Ruth Namazzi and her colleagues have been stopping one another in their hospital ward with worried looks.
Between treating patients, she says, they voice their concerns: “‘Malaria’s very stubborn,'” she says they tell her. “‘It’s not responding to treatment.'”
Namazzi is a pediatrician at MulagoHospital in Uganda, where — several times a day — she admits a child with severe malaria.
“These are very critically ill children,” she says, explaining that children are at greater risk of severe malaria than adults because they have not yet gained immunity. Severe malaria in a child can involve a high fever, convulsions, anemia, kidney damage and respiratory distres..