[HappyDreamer]

Makes me wonder if you live in one of the bigger cities? There're fewer mosquitos in the cities?

Whilst if living in a village on the country side, and one uses the malaria nets, maybe that's different? (malaria bigger problem?)

Edit: now I just noticed in a recent comment you wrote that you have "lost count of the number of times [you] have contracted malaria". Ok so that's a very different reason, than what I would have thought. Makes me even more curious about if you live in one of the big cities, or on the countryside /edit

> antipoverty infrastructure

What'd be the most important such things from your perspective?

[filleduchaos]

Stagnant water isn't a rural exclusive, and increased population density isn't a great way to slow transmission of a disease spread by an insect that relies on blood to reproduce. Either way, I've lived/been raised in a range of environments, from rural to the megacity I currently live in.

And yes, I've contracted malaria numerous times since I was a small child (much more frequently as a child, actually - it's slowed down to twice or so a year as an adult, due to partial acquired immunity). I'm not even an outlier in that regard; many people I know have a similar case history. We "survived" largely by virtue of being well-fed on varied, balanced diets and having informed, attentive parents who could afford to care for us properly (this sounds more complicated than it actually is - it's mostly making sure the child keeps to the medication schedule, taking steps to reduce the fever and providing enough sugar and iron to offset the worst of the hypoglycaemia/anaemia). If that sounds like a ridiculously low bar, that's because it is - and yet, it's a bar that millions of people fail to clear due to poverty.

> What'd be the most important such things from your perspective?

Short to medium-term, access to power and internet. The power grid is an embarrassment, internet infrastructure even more so. And a lot of other potential measures rest on those two - for example, it would be much easier/faster to provide financial services to the millions of unbanked/underbanked (or to provide supplementary education) over the internet, and having enough power to preserve food properly would go a long way in improving nutrition (all the way up to improving the efficiency of the supply chains).

Long-term, education. Illiteracy is a near-insurmountable barrier to economic advancement.

[HappyDreamer]

Thanks for the detailed reply!

One more thing comes to my mind: Overpopulation. Number of people growing faster than what hospitals and universities etc can be created?

And from what I've read elsewhere, the things you mentioned: health care, safe food supply, and education, is a good way to handle the problem with overpopulation -- since when people know there's a basic safety net, with health care and food, there's no need to have many children who can help out, when one is old.

> If that sounds like a ridiculously low bar

Yes and I'm actually a bit surprised. And now I understand better why good health care & anti-poverty things are that important for handling malaria