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Page: << Prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | Next >> But over the next 18 months, there were no deaths or cases of severe malaria, and the incidence of anemia and malaria parasites in the blood was reduced significantly in all three groups, Rosenthal noted.
A key to success was providing good health care for the children in general, not just for malaria, Rosenthal said. "There was free, good health care every time a child got sick," he said. "It shows that providing very good care, with careful attention to each episode of malaria, worked well."
The trial also established "a clear order ranking" of the treatments, with the regimen using the newer drugs working best, Rosenthal said.
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The results indicate that "improved malaria management, with evaluation and diagnosis-based treatment for all febrile [feverish] children, is a reasonable goal for Africa," but that continued research about diagnosis, drug delivery and integration of drug treatment with prevention strategies is needed, the report said.
A second trial, conducted in Pakistan, compared two combination treatments using antifolate drugs -- sulfadoxine-pyrimethamine and chlorproguanil-dapsone -- comparing each with a single-drug treatment using chloroquine against P. vivax malaria. This form of the disease causes 70 million to 80 million cases of malaria each year, and accounts for more than 50 percent of malaria cases occurring outside Africa.
The study, which included 767 malaria patients, found that while chloroquine worked best and remains the drug of choice, all three treatments were well-tolerated and cleared the body of malaria-causing parasites within 14 days.
"These drugs may be appropriate for unified treatment where species-specific diagnosis is unavailable, most likely in combination with other drugs," the researchers wrote.
A third paper concentrated on the fight against malaria in the United States. Researchers at the U.S., Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reviewed reports on cases of malaria reported in the United States from 1966 to 2006. That works out to an average of 1,200 cases annually -- almost all imported -- causing up to 13 deaths a year.
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