[Cerebral malaria, a key role for endothelial cells?]

Five to six hundred millions of people, throughout the world, suffer from malaria and more than one million die each year as a consequence, in about 20% of the cases, of cerebral malaria, an important complication of Plasmodium falciparum infection (Holding & Snow, 2001). Despite many studies, the physiopathology of these cerebral occurrences is not understood, especially concerning the intricacy and respective roles of the various mechanisms identified: sequestration of parasitized red cells in microvessels, cytokine secretion, changes in the T lymphocyte repertoire, host genetic factors driving sensitivity pathogenic factors from Plasmodium (Mazier et al., 2000).