The information on this website is not a substitute for diagnosis and treatment by a qualified, licensed professional. Although not a problem in the U.S., malaria kills more than one million people a year, and the drugs used to fight it are becoming increasingly ineffective due to the proliferation of resistant strains.
Malaria parasites enter the body through mosquito bites and feast on human blood.
They break down hemaglobin into protein and heme, an iron compound. The free heme component is toxic to the parasites, so they convert it into long molecular chains to render it harmless. Scientists at the University of Washington, in Seattle, may have found a way to treat malaria victims without drugs. In test tube experiments, they were able to destroy malaria parasites cultured in human blood by exposing them to a vibrating magnetic field for 48 hours. Apparently, the magnetic field interferes with the parasites' conversion of heme into its nontoxic form by vibrating the iron molecules in the blood.