The Dilemma of Falciparum Malaria and Telecommunications in Northeastern Nigeria

Abstract

The study of the prevalence of malaria, in relation to interpersonal communication ownership amongst adults and pregnant women in Adamawa. A database was designed at the American University of Nigeria, in collaboration with the Federal Medical Center in Yola. The database comprised patient information on age, sex, and the species of malaria, parasitaemia levels and ownership of interpersonal communication. For females, pregnancy status was noted. Over fortythree percent of all 1126 patients screened had malaria. Infection levels due to Plasmodium falciparum and P. malariae were 42.7% and 0.9 % respectively, demonstrating a significant difference (p<0.05) between these two different parasite species. Of the adults 77.8 % did not own cell phones (p<0.05) and 34.3% were women as compared to 23.4% of men. Sixty three percent of the pregnant women had malaria. The percent of pregnant women in this study who did not have any form of personal telecommunication was over ninety percent which was highly significant (p<0.05). High levels of infections due to the more deadly parasite P. falciparum were observed with sporadic cases of P. malariae in this region, and distinct differences in phone ownership based on gender in adults. The analysis of the patient database confirms a direct correlation between the absence of cell phones and the high prevalence of falciparum malaria particularly in women including pregnant women. Furthermore, higher P. falciparum levels were observed in women in the later stage pregnancy in comparison to those in the early stages.

Some Determinant Factors of Malaria Prevalence in Nigeria

“…In as much that malaria has the tendency of occurring with other infections especially the ones that has similar symptoms. Some of the notable symptoms include fever, malaise and weakness (Pam et al, 2015), fever, chills, headache, nausea, anorexia and anemia (Tyndall et al, 2012). Salmonella species from blood specimens of malaria patients 12% Nsukka, Nigeria.…”

“…Malaria infection caused by Plasmodium falciparum is more perilous during pregnancy (Adefioye et al, 2007) compare to other species of Plasmodium. Pregnant women and infants with malaria are high risk group (Enato et al, 2007;Tyndall et al, 2012) causing maternal, perinatal and fetal morbidity and mortality (Enato et al, 2007). Furthermore, Alaku et al (2015) also reported that pregnant women form a high risk group for malaria infection.…”

“…Furthermore, Alaku et al (2015) also reported that pregnant women form a high risk group for malaria infection. As such malaria in pregnant women has major public health challenges with serious concerns to both the foetus and the woman leading to maternal anemia, spontaneous abortion, stillbirth, premature delivery (Bawa et al, 2014), neonatal death, low birth weight and intrauterine growth retardation (Tyndall et al, 2012;Odikamnoro et al, 2014), miscarriage, still births and premature labour (Alaku et al, 2015), prenatal mortality, low birth weight and maternal anaemia (Okonko et al, 2010). Idowu et al (2009) reported that malaria during pregnancy account for about 10,000 maternal deaths per annum, 8-14% of all low-birth-weight in newly born children and 3-8% of all infant deaths.…”

Assessment of Malaria Parasitaemia among the Residents of Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC), FCT, Abuja, Nigeria

“…Moreover, it has been estimated to cause death of two million children globally per annum (Okafor and Oke-Oso, 2012). Globally, nearly 50% of the world's 3.28% to 3.40% billion people live in areas at risk of malaria infections (Tyndall et al, 2012, Orok et al,2016, which are distributed in 106 nations (Nigeria Fact Sheet, 2011 ). Okonko et al, 2010, reported that 300 to 500 million clinical cases occur globally leading to over 1 million deaths.…”