Mostly caring about your immediate neighbourhood and local effects does not mean ignoring that other places and their history exists.

For Malaria, there is not even a debate that it historically was a very widespread disease with high impact in economy and also in warfare. It is estimated that 60000 US soldiers died to Malaria alone in WW II.

Sure, and draining swamps caused floods and loss of biodiversity down the line.

I think people should be more modest and realistic, and not dream of solving every global problem. Not making things worse would already be a good start.