If you don't know the relationship between the Sickle Cell Anemia and Malaria, IT'S TIME TO LEARN!

Let's start by watching this cute little video ( please do watch! it's only 5 minutes :)

Sickle cell disease is an inherited disorder in which red blood cells (RBCs) are abnormally shaped. This abnormality can result in painful episodes, serious infections, chronic anemia, and damage to body organs.

It gets its name because a person's red blood cells are shaped like sickles, or crescent moons, instead of their usual round, disc shape.

Round is the healthiest shape for red blood cells (or RBCs) because they can move easily through the body. RBCs carry oxygen around your body, and every part of your body needs oxygen to work properly.

Many people don't know they have sickle cell trait. When both parents have the sickle cell trait, there's a 25% chance that a child will have sickle cell disease. But when one parent is carrying the trait and the other actually has the disease, the odds increase to 50% that their offspring will inherit the disease.

This picture briefly shows the process.

Malaria is a life-threatening disease caused by parasites that are transmitted to people through the bites of infected mosquitoes. 

The case of sickle cell anemia and malaria is an example of correlation without causation.

- ( now wait, if you are like " what is a correlation or causation!!" dont be stress, there is an little explanation for you )

Correlation: mutual relation of two or more things, parts, etc. Synonyms: similarity, correspondence,matching; parallelism.

Causation: the relation of cause  to effect; causality.-

Anyway, sickle cell anemia and malaria disease have a parallel relationship between them but one of them doesn't cause the other one. If a person inherits one copy of the sickle gene and the other being normal, this person gets advantageous than the others. Since, those who carry the sickle cell trait do not suffer nearly as severely from the disease. Also these carriers have been naturally selected, because the trait confers some resistance to malaria.

Bibliography 

"Sickle Cell Disease." KidsHealth - the Web's Most Visited Site about Children's Health. Web. 12 Feb. 2012. <http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/heart/sickle_cell_anemia.html>.

"WHO | Malaria." Web. 12 Feb. 2012. 

<http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs094/en/>.

"Evolution: Library: A Mutation Story." PBS: Public Broadcasting Service. Web. 12 Feb. 2012

<http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/01/2/l_012_02.html>.