Treating Malaria in Anlong Veng-With and Without Ta Mok
By Mhari Saito and Heng Sinith
The Cambodia Daily

Anlong Veng Town, Oddar Meanchey province - Eight months into her first 
pregnancy, 28-year-old Hun Nuon ended up in the only hospital of this former 
Khmer Rouge stronghold, fighting off the chills and fevers of malaria.
	Two days in the hospital left Hun Nuon so weak she could barely move 
and only talk in a low whisper. One arm lay protectively across her swollen 
abdomen, the other was connected to an intravenous drip.
	But Hun Nuon was better off than most who catch the mosquito-borne 
disease that ravages the surrounding jungle. Malaria has killed as many as eight 
patients at this hospital in the past six months, said Dim Sopha, an RCAF doctor. 
Many more never make it to the hospital.
	Health workers from the Ministry of Health's National Malaria Center 
tested people for malaria and left medicines for patients like Hun Nuon during a 
mission to this northern town last week. 
	Officials also brought 1,000 mosquito nets, treated with an insecticide 
non-toxic to humans, purchased with money donated by readers to The Cambodia 
Daily Mosquito Net Campaign. 
	Many more nets are needed, as are medical training and medications, said 
the National Malaria Center's Vice-Director Dr Doung Socheat. There are an 
estimated 30,000 people in highly malarial villages around Anlong Veng. 
	Malaria is nothing new for the people and Khmer Rouge-trained medical 
officers here. Hun Nuon said she has had malaria twice already. But what is new 
is that the Khmer Rouge government has been replaced and medicines must come 
from different places.
	Before the Khmer Rouge town defected to the government in April, the 
leadership provided medicine for its citizens. Hard-line commander Ta Mok 
distributed quinine and Artesimine, a very strong Chinese anti-malarial 
medication, for each family, said Dom Chhunly, the district chief here. There was 
never enough medicine to meet the patients' needs, said Kim Siyonn, a Khmer 
Rouge-trained medical assistant.
	Ta Mok has been at large somewhere along the Thai border since Anlong 
Veng fell to government forces last April.
	There are still not enough medicines. The hospital's pharmacy has 
medicine bottles neatly lined up on wooden shelves. Under each bottle, labels for 
basic drugs like quinine and paracetymol are written in English.  
	The labels were for Kim Siyonn's english practice. Kim Siyonn explained 
he had been studying English for less than a month. Just a few months ago, the 
former Khmer Rouge leadership would have killed the medical officer for 
studying it, he said. 
	Now, RCAF runs this town. RCAF medical staff take care of malaria 
patients in Ta Mok's unfinished hospital. On the first floor, RCAF soldiers lie in 
beds that sit on beautiful tile floors. A thick wooden bannister goes up the stairs to 
the second floor where there are more military patients with malaria, but instead 
of tile the floor is unfinished cement. Civilian patients, most with malaria, are on 
the third floor, where the bannister, the floor and several doors are all missing.
	This was the first visit here by government malaria officers since the 
1960s and officials are not clear what types of resistance are present. Malaria 
parasites on the western Cambodian-Thai border are resistant to some drugs.
	"This area is very difficult to provide drugs for...this is my worry," Doung Socheat said. 
	Health officials plan to return in coming months to distribute more nets 
and medicines. The National Malaria Center will hold training in Siem Reap for 
medical officers in Anlong Veng early next year, Doung Socheat said.
	In the meantime, Hun Nuon was recovering thanks to some Artesimine her 
husband had from an earlier distribution from Ta Mok's associates.
	Hun Nuon met her husband four years ago while he was a Khmer Rouge 
soldier in Kompong Cham province. Hun Nuon left her family-which she said 
includes her second cousin Hun Neang, Second Prime Minister Hun Sen's 
brother-and followed her husband to Anlong Veng.
	When asked what caused her to leave her family and begin the long path 
that would lead her to her current situation, sitting in an Anlong Veng bed waiting 
for her baby to come and malaria to subside, Hun Nuon shrugged.
	"I don't have enough money to go home," Hun Nuon said.