From Patient to Pioneer

It usually started with a headache. When Joshua Miago felt the familiar ache spread across his forehead, throbbing behind his eyes, he knew it was happening again. The malaria was back.

Next would come a fever. But the worst was the chills. As Joshua lay on the damp mattress he shared with his four siblings, he would pray that this time the diarrhea wouldn’t come. Their small shanty on the edge of the garbage dump didn’t have a bathroom or running water. And the humiliation of using a neighbor’s bathroom — it was all just too much.

Growing up in the Dandora slum of Kenya, Joshua never wondered if he would get malaria. It was how often. And how bad it would be this time.

“The many times I have had malaria, it always felt like a death sentence,” says Joshua. “I would get it three to four times a year. [I saw] firsthand many friends lose their battle to it.”

For those living in Dandora, malaria was inevitable. Their homes did little to protect them from mosquitos, especially during the rainy season, and few could afford mosquito nets or malaria medication.

But when Joshua was 10, his mother enrolled him at a Compassion center in their community. There, he received medical care, food and clothing. The day he was sponsored by Beth Bell, though, was the day his life truly changed.

“In her first letter, she wrote, ‘Joshua, welcome to our family. We love you very much,’” says Joshua. “I was a smart kid. However, I didn’t really try as much as I should have. When Beth came into my life and wrote letters asking me how I was doing in school, praising me when I sent her my report card … I can’t explain the value of those words.”

Joshua excelled in his studies, eventually studying biochemistry at Jomo Kenyatta University in Nairobi. But as he was finishing his degree, Joshua’s younger brother was diagnosed with rheumatic heart disease. Caused by an untreated strep infection, the disease is both treatable and preventable. But because of a lack of medical facilities and an inability to get proper care, Joshua’s brother died.

“My brother’s death had a huge impact in my life, and losing him was quite difficult,” says Joshua. “I wanted to work on something that would help me honor his memory but also benefit people.”

It was a newspaper article that Joshua read just after he finished his undergrad program that helped him find a way to honor his brother. The article was about malaria — that familiar disease that had nearly killed Joshua several times throughout his childhood. The article explained that children under 5 made up the largest segment of malaria-related deaths.

This information compelled Joshua to pursue malaria research.

Joshua began to look into programs that were working on malaria vaccinations — in his opinion the “magic bullet” to solving the malaria crisis. He applied for and received a scholarship at Radboud University in the Netherlands, where he studied Molecular Mechanisms of Disease. After receiving his masters in 2012 he went on to the University of California, Irvine, where he is currently a doctoral candidate researching malaria vaccinations.

Joshua knows the field of research is vast, and a malaria vaccine could be decades away. But he believes that even his small part in the process is a privilege.

“I am a tiny spot in malaria research,” says Joshua. “However, even if my name will be written in tiny letters or as an after note that I was involved in this research, I will have attained my dream.”