What You Should Know About Malaria Symptoms

The important thing to know about malaria symptoms is that there is variation in the incubation period of each case. This is the time taken for the signs of the illness to be noticeable after the initial infection.

The normal incubation period is between 9 and 14 days. Nevertheless symptoms could appear in as little as 7 days or the body can host the virus for as long as between 18 to 40 days. On occasion the disease has been known to take even up to 10 months to manifest.

Causes for this delay.

Built up body immunity of a person and if they are in general good health can delay manifestation of the disease.

Delays in incubation may also be because one is taking preventive medication but is infected nevertheless.

What is important to know is that especially at the onset, what are malaria symptoms may not follow a specific pattern and one should not strictly use the time factor as the basis for diagnosis. The infection could be present, showing little or no symptoms and yet continue to deteriorate because of staying unattended.

Symptoms

-- high fevers

-- chills

-- vomiting and nausea

-- loss of appetite

-- headaches

sweats

-- energy loss

-- tiredness

-- dry cough

-- muscle and back pain

-- enlarged liver and spleen

As shown a malarial attack can be very subtle and because a fever is often an early sign, any fever should be evaluated without delay by a health- care provider.

Severe malaria.

If the disease degenerates and continues to be unattended, further symptoms could include

-- yellowing of the eyes

-- convulsions

-- coma and shock

-- Failure of kidney and liver functions

-- a changed mental state and the start of cerebral malaria

So if you find you have any or some of these malaria symptoms, get an early diagnosis. Remember that malaria kills.

By Leo Safari