Malaria cases among Jordanian medical team on prophylactic mefloquine in sierra leone

Abstract EN

Objective: To describe malaria outbreak among medical Jordanian team members participating in Peacekeeping Forces in Sierra Leone. Methods: This is a retrospective review of 119 Military Jordanian males 32 of them (26%) were officers and the rest were enlisted.

The mission started in January 2002 and ended in July 2002.

Strict regulations were taken to insure that prophylactic mefloquine was taken on time and the measures against the vector were applied rigorously.

Thick and thin blood smears for malaria were adopted whenever a case of malaria was suspected.

In many cases, the test was repeated several times.

Due to the nature of the mission, which included internist physicians available 24 hours, the members were supervised continuously for any complication. Results: Out of the 119 members of the team, 18 (15.1%) had malaria during this mission period.

The species was Plasmodium falciparum.

All patients responded to treatment except one case, which was labeled as multi-drug resistant and subsequently was repatriated.

Compliance was nearly complete with mefloquine chemoprophylaxis.

The number of cases declined remarkably after revising and improving the measures against the malaria vector (15 vs.

3). Conclusion: In malarious areas, chemoprophylaxis with mefloquine is not enough to prevent infection, but it may ameliorate the clinical course.

Drastic measures against the vector must be deployed to reduce the incidence of this disease.