Quote Originally Posted by dreaming View Post
yes there is the risk of getting the parasite that eventually kills you but the chances of it is tiny.
On the contrary, the chances of being infected by P. Falciparum (the one that kills you) in sub-Saharan Africa is EXTREMELY high if you are bitten by a carrier mosquito. In some areas as high as 99% of all malaria is Falciparum. I've been trying to find statistics about what percentage of P. Falciparum patients WILL die if not treated in time. I suspect that the percentage will be staggeringly high. Two MILLION babies die in Africa each year from P. Falciparum. It's a deadly serious problem!

Of all the many, many, people I know who've contracted malaria, only one was not Falciparum.

A travel doctor in Durban may have suggested that the time of the year, and the countries you were visiting were low malarial risks (for example, most of Southern Africa in winter has virtually no malaria risk), and that's why he didn't recommend drugs, but any healthcare professional in South Africa would be acting negligently if, for example, you were heading for the Kruger park during the rain season, and they suggested that you shouldn't use prophylaxis. That really is playing with your life.