SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA - When officials speak of disease in
Africa, most people automatically think of the AIDS epidemic that continues to ravage most of this vast continent. Nevertheless, each year more than a million young Africans are succumbing -- not only to AIDS -- but to other diseases such as malaria, cholera, meningitis and tuberculosis.

At a time when Western Nations are hailing the defeat of nearly all childhood diseases, why do so many Africans continue to die?

"A recent upsurge of malaria in areas where disease seems to be ever-present is probably caused by many factors, including rapidly spreading resistance to antimalarial drugs, climactic changes, and population movements," a recent report found.

"In the last decade," the report continued, "the prevalence of malaria has been escalating at an alarming rate, especially in Africa. An estimated 300-500 million cases each year cause
1.5 to 2.7 million deaths, more than 90% of the deaths are in children under 5 years of age in Africa." Malaria ranks third among major infectious diseases in Africa after pneumococcal acute respiratory infections and tuberculosis.

Malaria cases in Africa account for approximately 90% of malaria cases in the world.

"Within the last ten years," explains Fr. John Lynch, "we
have seen malaria epidemics in 14 countries of Sub-Saharan
Africa." Fr. Lynch is the director of development for the
Missionaries of Africa. "Each of these epidemics killed an
incredible number of people," he continues, ". . . and many of these people lived in areas previously free from disease. Teenagers and young adults are now dying of severe forms of the disease."

"Diseases such as malaria appear to be thriving because of changing rainfall patterns as well as the parasites developing a resistance to the drugs. The major threat is to children and pregnant women, especially in the sub-Saharan region . . . but this should be everyone's concern -- not just the people of Africa!" The Missionaries of Africa are currently seeking donations to help provide clean water, medicine, mosquito
netting and other preventative measures for those in need.

EAST AFRICA - "To be poor often means to be sick." It's a phrase that has been touted by politicians, sociologists and doctors for more than a decade. But nowhere is this more evident than in the vast regions of Africa -- where poverty and ill-health go hand-in-hand. "They tend to reinforce each other" a report issued by an international health organization states.

"Health is closely related to access to safe water, something that more than a billion people lack. Waterborne diseases claim more than three million lives each year, mostly as a result of dysentery and cholera. These and other waterborne diseases take their heaviest toll among children." The study goes on to report that while infant mortality in the world's richest nations averages six deaths per thousand children born, in the Africa's poorest countries, 100 children die for every thousand children born . . . an increase of nearly 17 times as high or nearly 1,700%.

"Another reason for the partnership between sickness and poverty," another report explains, "is the lack of sanitation. More than two billion of the world's people live in villages or communities with inadequate or no sanitary facilities. Many of the world's poor lack knowledge of the basic principles of good hygiene. The poor and uneducated often do not
understand the mechanisms of infectious disease transfer and thus cannot take steps to protect themselves." Additionally, men, women and especially children with immune systems that have been weakened by hunger and food insecurity are more apt to become infected by common diseases.

"When children are poor," explains Fr. John Lynch, M. Afr., "they are often not vaccinated for what many of us in the Western world consider common diseases. Even though the vaccine may just cost a few pennies -- they are too poor to be able to afford the vaccine and too uneducated to know the lifesaving affect of such medicine -- even if they could afford it."

Among the leading infectious diseases, malaria claims more
than one million men, women and children every year -- and
more than 90% of these deaths are in Africa.

"It doesn't have to be this way," Fr. Lynch continues. "Many
nations have made tremendous strides in breaking the link
between being poor and being sick. If we continue to help those who need us most -- reaching out through education and economic development -- they will be successful as well!"