[samirmenon]

According to the WHO, malaria kills almost 500,000 children under 5 each year globally, though the vast majority (~90%) of these deaths are in Africa. [1]

In the US, 3,000-49,000 people die each year from the flu.[2]

Clearly, the scales are not comparable.

[1] http://www.who.int/malaria/media/world_malaria_report_2013/e...

[2] http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/qa/disease.htm#deaths

[harshmap]

"Influenza occurs globally with an annual attack rate estimated at 5%–10% in adults and 20%–30% in children. Illnesses can result in hospitalization and death mainly among high-risk groups (the very young, elderly or chronically ill). Worldwide, these annual epidemics are estimated to result in about 3 to 5 million cases of severe illness, and about 250 000 to 500 000 deaths."

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs211/en/

[nostromo]

> globally

vs.

> in the US

Speaking of incomparable scales...

[rev_bird]

Time to break out some napkin math:

627,000 malaria deaths * 90% in sub-Saharan Africa[1] = 564,000 malaria deaths in sub-Saharan Africa.

564,000 deaths / population of Africa (~815 million) = 69.2 African malaria deaths per 100,000 people.

--

About 32,743 U.S. flu deaths per year, recently.[2]

32,742 deaths / population of U.S. (~316 million) = 10.4 U.S. flu deaths per 100,000 people.

--

It looks like, by these numbers, that malaria in Africa is about 6.7 times as deadly as the flu in America.

[1] http://www.who.int/malaria/media/world_malaria_report_2013/e...

[2] http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2010/08/26/129456941/annual-...

[adventured]

Not to mention, we can eliminate an extreme majority of malaria deaths, and we can do so at a relatively low cost per person. Something the parent is ignoring entirely.