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Accompanying Matt in Mali is Dr. Steven Phillips, ExxonMobil's Medical Director for Global Issues and Projects. All Africa.com has kindly set up a travel-log for him, which I encourage readers to check out. Here is the start of his first post:

We are not yet into our descent into Bamako, capital of Mali, and we have been flying over an uninterrupted, gently undulating golden carpet for the past 45 minutes. As we begin our descent, the featureless monotonic vastness gives way to a blotchy canvas of white and gray. Finally a stark undulating ribbon of blue breaks the monotony. A short time later the hazy outlines of geometric man-made structures finally appear. Thus the transition from the Sahara to the Sahel and to the Niger River and landing at the Bamako airport. Our global health team to observe Mali's first ever integrated child health campaign has arrived.

Based on this aerial topographic introduction to Mali, it's hard to imagine that malaria would be a problem here. The culprit turns out to be the Niger River. As it snakes and bisects the entire width of the country, it becomes the source of enormous pockets and lagoons of standing water and forms a huge inland delta -- ideal mosquito breeding grounds. This is what makes malaria the number one killer of children under the age of five in Mali.

Posted by Mark Leon Goldberg at 9:58 AM