Malaria, Malaria

I tell you what, I've never been so sick before in my life. Thankfully, i've been getting better, but for a while, I was pretty miserable and the Lord has opened my eyes to others in places where malaria exists and I wonder what we can do about it. Can you imagine being in an environment where you sleep in the dust on the floor of a compound or mud hut where scorpions and spiders crawl across your legs in the middle of the night and know of nothing more? What about living in this environment, but not having a family. This environment where there is always a constant heat and for only 2 months of the year there is rain and a breath of fresh air. What about being in this environment and catching malaria. At one moment, your body temperature drops down to 95 degrees and there is uncontrollable shaking and shivering. Your body becomes cold and numb. And then the next moment, your temperature sky rockets and becomes 103.4 creating a terrible headache and causing you to vomit. Then your body starts sweating profusely and your temperature goes back down and then you are left exhausted. Imagine going through that cycle over and over and over again. Well, I did, but I had these cycles in the comfort of my home in Oxford where I could adjust the air to what I needed, I could take showers/baths whatever time I wanted, I had access to health care and medicine, I had the loving arms of my mother around me, the willingness of my father to bring me gaterade and slushies, and I had the comfort of friends encouraging me.

But imagine going through that in another place. I imagine the children who have no one to comfort them during these cycles. My brother, Clint had malaria in Africa two years ago and that fact really haunted him. Out of all of our teams that have gone to africa, 4 people have had malaria.

Malaria is a disease caused by the blood parasite Plasmodium, which is transmitted by mosquitoes. Malaria, from the Medieval Italian words mala aria or “bad air,” causes 350 million to 500 million illnesses per year and kills more than one million people – mostly children under the age of five.

Malaria is particularly devastating in Africa, where it is a leading killer of children. In fact, there are 10 new cases of malaria every second. Every 30 seconds, a child in Africa dies from a malaria infection.

Malaria is also the number one killer of refugees in Africa.

Malaria is Both Preventable and Treatable...

Is there something we can do about this? I pray that the Lord gives us opportunities to do something about this now that we know. Now that we've heard and been through, we've got no excuse. I've got no excuse.