Well, the trick there is to create a better economy, right? The standard of living will increase then. What are the most effective ways to prevent malaria is to give people $20 nets.

Turns out... one of the easiest ways to create a better economy is to eliminate malaria. It's that bad of a disease, that it contributes to poverty at the national level.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaria#Economic_impact

It's more difficult to expand and modernize your economy when a significant fraction of your population contracted mild brain damage from preventable infections.

But his goal is to eradicate it, not only prevent it. Preventing is a step towards his goal.

I'm not at all convinced that a higher standard of living inevitably leads to lower malaria infections. I actually think the correlation is rather weak, at least in the initial part of eradicating/battling the disease.

I agree with you that controlling the disease by having a stable, efficient and proactive health care system requires a solid economy. I just don't think that's where the problem lies for the moment.

$4 nets!*

http://www.againstmalaria.com/DollarsPerNet.aspx

* (plus shipping and handling)

It looks like $3.

melling@Hacker News just bought 10 nets.

http://www.againstmalaria.com/MyNets.aspx?DonationID=111536

I didn't want to round down and appear to be over-hyping.

Well done.