Doctoral Dissertation Research: Social-Environmental Dynamics of Malaria Eradication in Northwest Argentina Since 1900

Vector-borne infectious disease continues to be a major obstacle to social and economic development in less developed countries. Malaria was once thought to be eradicated from areas outside the tropics but it is making a major resurgence, possibly due to the impacts of global climate change. This doctoral dissertation research project will quantify changing spatial patterns of the incidence of malaria in Northwest Argentina during the 20th century, and it will analyze the relationship of these changes to environmental, socioeconomic, and land-use variables as well as improve understandings of the role of malaria control efforts in the Argentine state's broader political and ideological projects. Although the direct causes of malaria are well understood, the relative roles of larger associated causes are uncertain and are the subject of scientific and policy debate. Using statistical and spatial analysis, including geographic information systems (GIS), this research will determine which factors best explain variation in malaria incidence as well as variation in rates of malaria reduction. Research methods will integrate field work, archival sources, and GIS-based spatial and statistical analyses. Historical research will be both quantitative and qualitative in nature. Historical rates of malaria incidence and mortality will be documented through the use of publications of public health agencies of the Argentine government. Socioeconomic, environmental, and land-use data will be derived from various sources, including decennial census data, remote-sensing images and data, aerial photographs, agricultural censuses, property deed registers, cadastral maps, topographic maps, land division proceedings, and probate records. Once baseline data has been collected, univariate and multivariate regression analysis will be used to assess the relative weight of different variables and to analyze the regional and local differences in rates of malaria incidence. A GIS will be used to correlate socioeconomic, environmental, land use, and malaria-incidence coverages. GIS-based spatial statistical analysis and mapping output will be used to identify specific land-use practices that intensify or ameliorate malaria incidence. Qualitative archival research will focus on interpreting the rhetoric and claims of physicians, public health officials, politicians, and bureaucrats involved in the anti-malaria campaigns, especially as they pertain to issues of environmental perceptions, economic development, and national identity.

This research will advance knowledge of the human-environmental interactions of malaria in the subtropics of developing countries in general and in Argentina and southern South America in specific. The related issues of disease ecology and human health and human-environment interaction in southern South America has received scant attention from geographers and other social scientists. This research will advance interdisciplinary research by developing methodological approaches that combine spatial analytical tools involving GIS with historical archival sources, to explore the interrelated nature of disease, land-use change, socioeconomic development, and national identity formation. This research will advance understanding in the broad themes of the geography of development and global environmental change, and it will draw on historical and contemporary experiences in Argentina to to determine the importance of land-use change, especially through deforestation and expansion of irrigation, in contributing to malaria incidence. Human-environmental and historical geographic studies such as this promise to contribute an important perspective on the relationship between global environmental change and disease, and to provide lessons for present-day control of vector-borne disease. As a Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement award, this award also will provide support to enable a promising student to establish a strong independent research career.