Malaria (Click Images to Play Animations)

Humans contract malaria from the bite of malaria infected female mosquitos. When bitten, the mosquito injects saliva containing the infectious form of the malaria parasite, known as a sporozoite, into a person's bloodstream. These threadlike sporozoites circulate in the blood for a short time.

Eventually, some of the sporozoites make their way to the liver, where they enter the liver cells. Once inside a liver cell, each sporozoite develops into a schizont, a structure that will eventually contain thousands of tiny rounded merozoites.

When the schizont matures, the liver cell ruptures and these merozoites are released into the bloodstream. This process may take as little as 8 days or as long as several months.

Merozoites released from the liver rapidly invade red blood cells where they multiply. In the process of multiplying the red blood cells rupture releasing more merozoites back into the blood. This process continues until most of the red blood cells are either infected or destroyed.

A small number of the merozoites may develop into male and female gametocytes. If the person is bitten by an uninfected female mosquito, these are taken up and the mosquito now becomes capable of infecting other humans.

With the release of merozoites into the blood, patients often develop symptoms. For most people, symptoms begin 10 days to 4 weeks after initial infection. Such symptoms include fever, chills, joint pain, headache, vomiting and tiredness. Because of the destruction of red blood cells, patients also often develop anemia, and if not treated, malaria infections can progress to severe disease and even death.

For more info, visit Our Products.

All animations on this website are governed by copyrights laws. Click Legal Notice below for Disclaimer.