Prevalence of Malaria Infection in District Dir Lower, Pakistan

Abstract

| Malaria is a mosquito borne infectious disease caused by protozoan parasite of the genus Plasmodium. In Pakistan, P. vivax and P. falciparum are common species. The current study was designed to investigate the prevalence of malaria infection in District Lower Dir Pakistan. A total of 1750 blood samples were collected from seven tehsils of District Lower Dir ( January to December 2013). The data were analysed tehsils wise, month wise, gender wise, age wise and species wise. Thick and thin smear were prepared and examined under microscope. The data was statistically analysed in Microsoft excel. Out of 1750, 214 (12.2%) blood samples were found positive. The higher rate of infection was found under the age group of ten year (14.9%) and lowest rate of infection was found (9.30%) in the age group of 11-30 in female. The maximum number of cases of malaria were detected in August (21.37%) and minimum number (4.8%) in January. The highest prevalence of malaria was noticed 15.2% in tehsil Timer gara and the lowest prevalence 9.6% was recorded in Samar Bagh. Gender wise prevalence was higher in children (14.9%) than in females (9.30%). The prevalence of P. vivax was higher (90%) than that of P. falciparum (10%). Consequently, the children under the age of ten years were found highly effected and implicated with weak immunity whereas P. vivax was found the most common causative agent of malaria in District Dir Lower, which needs immediate attention to take preventive measures. Article History Received: August 09, 2018 Revised: July 26, 2019 Accepted: August 08, 2019 Published: December 04, 2019 Authors’ Contributions HU and MIUK collected the data and wrote the paper. Suleman, SJ, AQ, MN and SK reviewed the paper critically. SAM lead the study.