This article originally appeared at the BBC:
Drug-resistant malaria has been detected at the Myanmar-India border and now poses an “enormous threat” to global health, scientists have said.
The ability of the malaria parasite to shrug off the effects of artemisinin has been spreading since it emerged in South East Asia.
Tests, published in Lancet Infectious Diseases, now show this resistance on the verge of entering India.
Experts said the development was “alarming”.
Deaths from malaria have nearly halved since 2000, and the infection now kills about 584,000 people each year.
But resistance to artemisinin threatens to undo all that hard work, and it has been detected in:
- Cambodia
- Laos
- Thailand
- Vietnam
- Myanmar, also known as Burma
Blood samples from 940 people with malaria from 55 sites across Myanmar showed this resistance was widespread across the country.
One site, in the Sagaing region, showed that resistant parasites were just 25km (15 miles) from the Indian border.