Inherent Interconnection.

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” - John Muir (1838 – 1914)


Today I stumbled upon the above diagram of malaria percentages on the island of Madagascar, published by the CDC in 2006. Notice the largest dot and the associated percentage of malaria cases. The corresponding image is a Google Earth shot of the area comprising the largest gray dot, which includes two river deltas both heavily overloaded with erosion sediment from the burned rainforests (orange).

There are many factors contributing to the high percentage of malaria cases in this region such as higher population and port proximity to the Comoros Islands where new strains of Malaria arrived from. But this area is also the driest ecosystem on the island. Malaria typically proliferates in more humid climates.

So, back to my theory that sediment overload of water courses ultimately causes Malaria and in the cycle of things, nothing can exist separate from land use. Although the burning of the rainforests may be happening far upstream from these deltas, it is causing an increase in disease at the river mouth. In the United States, obesity (and therefore diabetes) is a result of land use (higher percentages in suburbs than cities), and in the third world, Malaria is a result.