£2.9m grant awarded to explore zoonotic malaria infection
16 January 2012 °®ÍþÄÌapp of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine °®ÍþÄÌapp of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine https://lshtm.ac.uk/themes/custom/lshtm/images/lshtm-logo-black.pngThanks to the , supported by four UK research councils (, , & ), researchers at the School will now be able to investigate how the parasite, previously only identified in macaques, has crossed species and is now causing acute disease and death in humans.
The first official cross-transmission from monkey to man of Plasmodium knowlesi was confirmed in 1965 by an investigation in Malaysia. Since 2004, have been increasing in South East Asia, some of which have severe or even fatal outcomes.
To date, it is unclear if this increase is due to better diagnostics or other environmental and behavioural changes that might bring macaques and their associated mosquito vectors in closer contact with humans.
and from the School's will lead an international team with the skills to understand the clinical, social, entomological, primatological and environmental factors contributing to the transmission of this new infection, focusing their investigations in Palawan, in the Philippines, and Sabah, Malaysia.
The work will be conducted with research partners from the and in the UK, and (also in the Philippines), and the , both in Malaysia, and the in Australia.
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