Who discovered malaria?
Camillo Golgi
A French Army physician Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran discovered that malaria was caused by microscopic parasite (now called "Plasmodium falciparum") in 1880. But scientists were sceptical until Golgi intervened. It was Golgi who helped him prove that malarial parasite was a microscopic protozoan. From 1885, Golgi studied the malarial parasite and its transmission. He established two types of malaria, tertian and quartan fevers caused by "Plasmodium vivax" and "Plasmodium malariae" respectively. In 1886, he discovered that malarial fever (paroxysm) was produced by the asexual stage in the human blood (called erythocytic cycle, or Golgi cycle). In 1889-1890, Golgi and Ettore Marchiafava described the differences between benign tertian malaria and malignant tertian malaria (the latter caused by "P. falciparum"). By 1898, along with Giovanni Battista Grassi, Amico Bignami, Giuseppe Bastianelli, Angelo Celli and Marchiafava, he confirmed that malaria was transmitted by "Anopheline" mosquito.
J. B. S. Haldane
In 1949, Haldane proposed that genetic disorders in humans living in malaria-endemic regions provided a phenotype with immunity to blood-borne haemophiles. He noted that mutations expressed in red blood cells, such as sickle-cell anemia and various thalassemias, were prevalent only in tropical regions where malaria has been endemic. He further observed that these were favourable traits for natural selection which protected individuals from receiving malarial infection. This concept of resistance to malaria was eventually confirmed by Anthony C. Allison in 1954.