Cheap jabs for the grunts
From Fiammetta Rocco Sin While researching The Miraculous Fever Tree, my recent book about malaria and the discovery of quinine, [learnt that one of the main reasons France failed in its attempt to build a canal across the isthmus of Panama in the mid19th century was that the Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interoceanique took a board decision not to dose its workers with quinine. This was despite the fact that they were losing up to 100 men a day to malaria and that quinine had been proved to be remarkably effective in treating the disease during the American civil war. It was cheaper, the French decided, to let their workers die — and replace them when necessary.
Anyone who has spent even a short time researching the options will know that the anti-malarial of choice, if you are travelling to Liberia or elsewhere in Africa ('How to scare a US marine', 29 November), is the new drug Malarone, and not mefloquine, or Larium as it is usually called.
Malarone has none of the horrible side effects associated with Larium, and has proved in a number of studies to be more effective than the mefloquine-based drug, even against the deadly falciparum malaria.
The only problem is this: a six-week course of Malarone retails at £127, while Larium costs £23. Granted, the US army could probably cut a better deal with GlaxoSmithKline, which manufactures Malarone. Even so, is it possible that the Americans, like the French before them, are sending their boys to the tropics on the cheap?
Fiammetta Rocco Literary editor, The Economist, London SW1
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