Cultural Anthropology: Biological and Cultural Factors of Malaria

This essay examines the intricate interplay of biological, cultural, and environmental factors in human adaptation to malaria. It discusses how the malaria parasite has driven genetic evolution, leading to variations in immune responses and resistance among different ethnic populations. The essay also explores the impact of environmental changes, such as climate change and pollution, on malaria transmission and vector adaptation. Furthermore, it delves into the socio-cultural aspects, including social beliefs, economic conditions, and traditional medical practices, highlighting how these factors influence vulnerability and adaptation to malaria. The introduction of modern medical technology and its effects on ancient local beliefs are also discussed. Desklib offers a wealth of similar resources for students seeking to deepen their understanding of anthropology and related topics.

Running head: CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Cultural Anthropology
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Malaria is a vector-borne disease that affects a huge number of population around the
world. The disease is caused by the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum, which is
transmitted by the mosquito. The wild type disease was found in sub-Saharan Africa almost
42000 years ago (Price, 2018). Till then, the disease causes various changes in human genome
and as well as affect the evolution of human. In addition to this, several cultural factors like
environmental changes, inheritance of various beliefs and practices, and as well as social systems
have contributed to then adaptation of malaria in human. In this essay, the biological and as well
as the cultural factors of malaria adaptation is discussed briefly.
Malaria is assumed to be a one of the strongest factor for the evolutionary selection in the
history of human evolution. Malarial adaptation has caused in the change in the human genomic
level. It is seen that the HbS allele has increased in numbers in the population who have already
exposed to the disease. Although there was cases of mortality. Along with this different
population around the world has developed various evolutionary changes in response to the
exposure of malaria. For example, the HBB gene has 3 coding SNPs to prevent malaria. They are
Glu6Val ( HbS), Glu6Lys ( HbC), Glu26Lys (HbE). The HbS is mainly popular in the African
region, but it is not found in the Southeast Asia. In addition to global differentiation, local gene
pool also showed significant difference in Africa. Presence of different malaria-resistance gene
in different places suggested that evolutionary changes has occurred by the effect of
malaria(Taylor, Cerami & Fairhurst, 2013). The haplotype analysis and the statistical modelling
of G6PD locus indicates that the origin was 10000 years old. Analysis of 100 mtDNA showed
that the parasite of the malaria have already existed 100,000 years ago. Although the malaria
parasite of Africa had increased almost 10,000 years ago and slowly expanded in various area
around the world. This result along with the analysis of polytene chromosome have proved the

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fact that the malaria parasite acted as the reservoir during the evolutionary procedure of human
(Mangano & Modiano, 2014). The variation in the genetic component also suggested towards the
matter genetic component of the individual showed various immunological responses against the
disease. In relation to this, it can be seen that different ethnic population has evolved different
resistance against malaria during the evolutionary process. Although, it is also documented that
the ethnic groups who lived in the same region also had different resistance to the malaria. For
example, Fulani population are mainly found in the West Africa and lived with other ethnic
population. It had observed that, the Fulani population had low rate of malaria prevalence in
comparison to other ethnic population lived in that region. Detailed epidemiological studies
showed that the resistance against the malaria in Fulani population had come due to genetical
evolution that is genetical changes in response to malaria. The Fulani population had more
number of antimalarial antibodies and along with this increased amount of IL-4 is also
responsible for the protection of malaria (Cherif et al., 2016). In that study, it was revealed that ,
the IL4-524 T allele was responsible for the high level of antibody against malaria antigen
(Calixto Fernandes,2013). In a malaria endemic region, one of the most common genetical
alteration was onset of sickle cell anemia. The mutation of sickle cell anemia is a recessive
disease that is the disease is found only in the people who two copies of altered gene. The
carriers, that is the person who have only one copy of altered gene, showed resistance to malaria.
This phenomenon is known as heterozygote advantage. The alteration is closely associated with
the human evolutionary process (Gong et al., 2016).
Environmental changes mainly the climatic changes cause alteration in the vector borne
diseases like malaria. With global climatic change, the concern of disease dynamics has changed
globally. The vector of malaria and the parasite responsible for the disease are very much

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sensitive to the climatic change. In a study, it is seen that the parasite of malaria transmitted well
in the temperature range of 30-32 degree centigrade. The required rain- fall level for best
transmission of malaria parasite was about 15-17 mm per day (Ngarakana-Gwasira et al., 2016).
From this finding, it can be said that the climatic change made the malaria a serious threat
throughout the world. In another study it is seen tat between the time of 2000 -2010, the incident
of malaria had reduced globally by 17% (Caminade et al., 2014). Environmental pollution is
another important factor that contribute to the adaptation of malaria. With growing population,
urbanization is also increased. As a result, of urbanization, pollution has also come in to the
scenario of malarial development. The larvae of the malaria vector breeds in a clean water.
However in a recent study it seen that with growing pollution, the vectors of the malaria also
adapt themselves to a polluted water bodies. The study showed that larvae can survive in the
polluted condition as well due to the exposure in polluted environment (Bichet et al., 2013). The
social and cultural factors are another crucial factors of human evolution in adaptation to
malaria. The social and cultural phenomena that are associated with the human evolution are
mainly social beliefs, social status, social structures, social roles, and also economic condition.
Along with this the health resources is also associated with the economic condition of the human
society that is the population who have more power can earn more money and can have more
health resources in comparison to the economically backward people in the society. There is a
close relationship between the malaria and the literacy rate in the population. The economically
backward peopke generally have lower rate of literacy. As a result, they do not have proper
knowledge about the disease. As a result, they became more malaria prone. Lack of awareness
also promotes outcome of the disease more in the poor people. The social environment promotes
malaria by driving them towards the disease during various social activities. One of the major

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cause of this drive towards the disease is poor economic condition of the people. They have to do
various risky economic activity due to their poverty. They are forced to do risky works like
deforestation for land and as a result, they are directly exposed to the vector of the malaria. The
lack of proper shelter is also another social aspect of malaria. The poor people generally lives in
a very congested environment and due to lack of proper knowledge they don’t even know about
the fact that malarial mosquito completes their breeding only in the fresh water and as a result
they do not maintain proper cleanliness around them. Moreover, they are more exposed to the
disease (Rapoport, 2016). The use of bed net was a preventive measure for the malaria, although,
the economic condition of the poor people did not allow them to buy the bed net. Another social
factor in adaptation to malaria is ignorance local medical cultures of malaria prevention. In
relation to the previous fact, people who lives near the forest region, had their own of mosquito
prevention and they were not ready to accept the modern culture as this practice had inherited
from their previous generations. From very ancient time, malaria was a serious problem. The
local population have evolved various measures to combat against malaria by various trial and
error method. The local population has learned about the malaria traditionally and as well as
locally. For example there is a local belief that malaria is caused by the “ mal-air” that is the bad
condition of air is responsible for the disease. This belief was established by the experience and
observation of the local people and they established relation among the malaria and humidity of
the air. People have understood that they can protect themselves by avoiding the air during the
rainy season of the year. Another belief was that, malaria was a related to forests, water bodies
and teak flowers and they believed that the disease was nothing but a forest fever. From this
believe, they learned to protect themselves from the disease by avoiding the forests near water
bodies, and also they avoided forest during the blooming season of teak flower. However there

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was no documented prove of effectiveness of this beliefs, the people participated in those
practice. Those beliefs have inherited over the time from one generation to another. The
introduction of modern medical technology introduced contradiction in between the ancient local
beliefs and the modern concepts. This resulted in community problem and people gradually
became adapted to the modern concepts (O’Neill et al., 2015).
In conclusion, it can be said that the most common vector borne disease around the
world, has serious impact on the human genetic evolution and the evolution is also region
specific. The entire region in this world has not similar genomic adaptation. Not only the
biological factors,but the socio- cultural and environmental factors are also associated with the
adaptation process of the malaria. The socio-economic factor and inheritance of ancient beliefs
from generation to generation has also left prints of contribution in the adaptation of malaria.

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