Well maybe you know what it is like to be kicked out of places.
Kicked out because some of your kind have injured and hurt their kind.
Kicked out of your favorite places to eat. Your favorite places to socialize.
It’s just not fair, I tell you. Some have even been so bold as to claim that we are the most dangerous animals on earth. I’d like to see some evidence for that claim, that’s for sure. These humans claim that they are working towards tolerance and acceptance of all… what about me, the mosquito?
—
April 25 is World Malaria Day.
I think calling it World Malaria Day sounds funny. As if they want the whole world to get Malaria, or as if it is a good thing. I guess International Squash Malaria Day just doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.
When I got the April blog challenge from Compassion to highlight World Malaria Day, I thought, ok, cool, I can do this. Then I kept reading and saw, “from the point of view of a mosquito,” and then I thought all hope was lost. I haven’t done a creative writing assignment since high school. When I asked Andy for inspiration he said something along the lines of, “Just pretend you’re a vicious blood-sucking animal.” Well, that advice and a little Wikipedia reading on mosquitoes helped me produce the short piece above that is supposed to be written from the point of view of the mosquito. Let’s just say I’m not going to be winning any writing awards anytime soon. (There’s a reason I didn’t major in the humanities…)
So in the attempt to spread the message of World Malaria Day, which is actually anti-Malaria, here are some numbers that illustrate why we should care about the toll malaria is taking on our world.
Malaria kills 655,000 children per year, many of them are under the age of 5 and living in Sub-Saharan Africa. The thing is that Malaria is a treatable, preventable disease but many just don’t have the resources to treat or prevent it. A $10 insecticide treated net could drastically reduce the risk of these children contracting the disease.
That’s where groups like Compassion attempt to intervene and help prevent occurrences of Malaria.
- Providing households at risk with treated mosquito nets
- Educating family members on malaria prevention
- Treating those suffering from malaria, chagas disease and dengue fever
Are you interesting in doing something to change this reality? Check out Compassion’s Malaria Intervention page.
Much Love,
Sarah
Adventures of Our Own 