Malaria

Today is World Malaria Day.  I don't know all the statistics, nor do I understand how it can be wiped out or even all the government issues.  But I do know what it is.  I will try to describe it from first hand experience and observation.
My son, Charlie/Chuck, went with me to Ghana in 2004. Towards the end of our trip, we had returned to the capital and a hotel with hot running water and air conditioning, Charlie woke up and said his legs hurt.  He took a shower, then said he hurt all over.  I knew enough to know what it was.  Within one hour we were at a hospital waiting in line to see a doctor.  For $6, total, we had paid the bill and bought medicine.  He spent the next 48 hours in bed with what he describes as " 10 times worse than any flu."
In 2009 I was teaching school in Ghana.  My roommate came down with malaria.  Head ache, fever, diarrhea , vomiting, chills... She also began taking medicine within an hour of waking with it.  Three days later she was still in bed with an IV hooked to our laundry drying rack.
A couple of months after this I woke in the middle of the night.  Fever, headache and vomiting.  My roommate went to the pharmacy with $3 and got my medicine.  I was able to shower, drink water, take ibuprofen and lie in bed under a ceiling fan.  I slept all day.  Weird dreams, chills, then hot, and EXTREMELY tired.  But, for me, it only lasted one day... Probably due to already being on doxycycline to fight it.
Adamu, my little "foster" daughter had it several times in the year I lived  there.  One night, in particular, I showered her three times to reduce the 106 degree temperature.  Kids in African get malaria many, many times!  Several times at the school I would feel the head of a child who was too tired to hold up their head.  I had the only thermometer in town.  Kids would have 104, 105 or 106 temperatures and be at school!  They shake all over and the pain is excruciating.  An insurance card in Ghana is 5 cedi, almost a weeks wages for some.  Medicine is $3 - $5.  Children die from the fever, dehydration or other complications.  Children lose their hearing or suffer brain damage.  But even without these complications,  imagine 104 temperature, diarrhea and vomiting in a hut with no water or electricity, when the temperature outside matches your body temp.
This is a way of life in Ghana (and many countries around the world).  Parents know the risk.  They have had friends and family die from the disease.  It is as common as colds here in America, but with each episode their children are at risk of death.  It is preventable and I have heard it said that if American children were at risk we would eradicate malaria.  I don't want to get political, I don't even understand it all.  But there are warriors out there fighting this disease.  Please, for more information about what we can do go to http://malarianomore.org/.  There's tons of information there as well as many ways to help.