Abstract:
Clinical immunity to malaria was studied by testing for presence of malaria parasitaemia
among 1204 patients presenting either with fever or with selected non-specific symptoms, to
different types of clinics (i.e. government medical institutions, private medical clinics and
malaria mobile clinics), in a district in Northern Sri Lanka, which is endemic for malaria.
All the patients were subjected to microscopic examination for malaria parasite. A sample
of patients was tested by Dipstick method also at recruitment. Socio-demographic
information of the patients was obtained using an interviewer administered questionnaire.
During the 6-month period of the study only 26 malaria positive patients were identified. All
identified malaria positives were P. vivax cases. Considering the age distribution of
positives cases, there is significant reduction in the number of malaria cases with increase in
age (pO.OOI). The highest proportion of cases were found among the 1-10 year age group.
and no cases were detected among those over 50 years of age When considering the duration
of stay, people who had malaria (confirmed by microscopy) had been living in Vavuniya
district for lesser number of years when compared to those who had no malaria .
