What could cause a malaria comeback in the US — and what could stop it – By Keren Landman (VOX) / Oct 6, 2023
Americans shouldn’t take a malaria-free future for granted.
On October 4, the Arkansas Department of Health announced a case of local malaria transmission, making it the fourth state to do so this year.
Details have not been released, and it’s not yet clear which species of malaria is involved. But with this case, a drumbeat that started in early summer continues: Since May, nine people in the US (seven in Florida, one in Texas, one in Maryland, and this latest case) have acquired malaria within the country’s borders. That’s pretty uncommon — at least, in this century; until the 1950s, malaria was a persistent plague in the US, especially in the Southeast.
Many of the conditions that favor malaria’s spread haven’t changed much since then. The Anopheles mosquitoes that spread malaria still thrive in many parts of the country, and states that receive high numbers of travelers from countries where malaria is endemic still have warm, wet weather that favors mosquito reproduction.
Nevertheless, it’s extraordinarily rare for American mosquitoes to be infected with malaria. Since the turn of the last century, there have been only about a dozen cases of local malaria transmission in the US. But the disease remains a major force of destruction elsewhere in the world: In 85 countries across Africa and parts of Asia and South America, malaria caused 240 million illnesses and 627,000 deaths in 2020 alone.
