Local Nonprofit Providing Care To Countries Suffering From Malaria

Malaria isn't common in the United States, but doctors say Americans who get it are easily treated.

The disease is easy to diagnose and treat but can be deadly if medicine isn't given in time.

In Tulsa, dozens of missions groups go overseas to treat people with Malaria.

A local nonprofit group said the same countries battling the Ebola epidemic have been suffering for years with widespread Malaria outbreaks.

Malaria is a prominent mosquito-borne disease killing West Africans. Humans can only get Malaria from a mosquito; an infected human cannot pass it to another person.

Symptoms are easy to spot. Flu-like chills and an inconsistent fever are tell-tale signs.

"The strange thing about Malaria is there is a cycle of about two days where you have the flu and chills, then those taper off and in another two days they come back, so it's a cycle-type thing," said Pharmacist Barry Ewy with Blessings International.

Blessings International provides medicine for Tulsa nonprofit groups that go on mission trips to areas affected by widespread disease.

Ewy said local missionaries are prepared.

Some of that preparation begins in a Broken Arrow warehouse where they repackage medicine.

“It is difficult, if not impossible, to treat Ebola, so we are not sending medications to treat that but we are sending medications to treat patients for Malaria as well as other infectious diseases,” said Ewy.

The C.D.C. said an estimated 219 million cases of Malaria occurred worldwide in 2010 and 660,000 people died, most, 91 percent, in the African region.

“The deaths are occurring in that African region primarily and it's because their inability to have access to the medicine. If people have access to the medicine it's very treatable,” Ewy said.

It's also inexpensive to treat.

“For one person with malaria its about four or five dollars, so we calculated the cost for treating five children with Malaria is only ten dollars,” Ewy said.

He said the patient being treated at OSU Medical Center in Tulsa who tested positive for Malaria will likely be okay if there are no other infections.

10/31/2014 Related Story: Patient In Isolation At Tulsa Hospital Tests Positive For Malaria

Ewy estimates the United States sees 1,500 cases of Malaria every year.