Low red cell production may protect against severe anemia during a malaria infection – insights from modeling

Deborah Cromer (1, 2, 3) , Jaroslav Stark (1, 2) , Miles P Davenport (3)

1 Department of Mathematics [Imperial College London]
2 Imperial College London
3 Department of Haematology

The malaria parasite causes lysis of red blood cells, resulting in anemia, a major cause of mortality and morbidity. Intuitively, one would expect the production of red blood cells to increase in order to compensate for this loss. However, it has been observed that this response is weaker than would be expected. Furthermore iron supplementation for iron deficient children in malaria endemic regions can paradoxically adversely affect the clinical outcome of malaria infection. A possible explanation may lie in the preference that some malaria parasites show for infecting immature red blood cells (reticulocytes). In the presence of a parasite preference for immature red cells, a rise in red cell production can ‘fuel the fire' of infection by increasing the availability of the parasite's preferred target cell.

Mots clés: Reticulocytes; Erythropoiesis; Mathematical; Hematopoiesis; Iron; Red Cells

Deborah Cromer, Jaroslav Stark, Miles P Davenport. Low red cell production may protect against severe anemia during a malaria infection – insights from modeling. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 2009, 257 (4), pp.533. ⟨10.1016/j.jtbi.2008.12.019⟩. ⟨hal-00554553⟩