According to scientists, Southeast Asia is in serious danger after the emergence of a drug-resistant strain that cannot be treated with existing drugs. For the WHO, the problem is not localised and could get out of control. Each year, the disease kills more than 600,000 people around the world.

Yangon (AsiaNews/Agencies) - A group of US experts are raising the alarm over the spread of drug-resistant malaria in several Southeast Asian countries. If this is confirmed, global gains in the fight against the mosquito-borne disease could be jeopardised.

Every year, more than 600,000 people die from the disease. Although Africa has dubious distinction of having the highest number of victims, the nations along the Mekong River harbour the most serious threat.

Over the past decade, the availability of artemisinin-based therapies has helped cut global malaria deaths by a quarter. However, resistance to the drug emerged on the Thai-Cambodia border in 2003, and has since been confirmed in Vietnam and Myanmar as well. The problem has also been detected in southwest China and is suspected in Guyana and Suriname.

Scientists warn that this could be a health catastrophe in the making, as no alternative anti-malarial drug are presently available.

For the UN World Health Organization (WHO), what seems to be a localised threat could however easily get out of control and have serious implications for global health.

Now, the real danger is that artemisinin may no longer be sufficient. This is especially disquieting because drug-resistance has happened before with chloroquine, which helped eliminate malaria from Europe, North America, the Caribbean and parts of Asia and South-Central America during the 1950s.

In Myanmar's case, 70 per cent of its 55 million people live in malaria-endemic areas, accounting for about three-quarters of malaria infections and deaths in the Mekong region.

In view of its poor health care system, it is doubtful that the country would be able to contain the rapid spread of the disease.

• southeast
• asia
• myanmar
• malaria