Age: 50,000 years old, approximately.
Appearance: Under a microscope, a bunch of little lopsided circles.
It's a disease though, innit? It is. One that kills between 1 million and 3 million people a year, largely in sub-Saharan Africa.
It's the one Cheryl Cole had, right? Correct.
So why is it in the news? Has some kind of vaccine been developed? Not yet, no. But malaria is becoming the must-have celebrity ailment of 2010.
Because Cheryl Cole had it? One swallow don't make a summer, mate. Not just Cheryl. Chelsea striker Didier Drogba has also recently been diagnosed with malaria, and began treatment on Monday.
How awful. Is his football career over? Not at all. He came on as a sub against Liverpool on Sunday, and was to due to play against Fulham tonight.
Cheryl was at death's door, and he hasn't even had to adjust his schedule! Drogba probably acquired some level of immunity during his childhood in Ivory Coast.
There's some kind of connection here, isn't there? No there isn't.
Yes there is: Ashley Cole. He plays for Chelsea! Cheryl must have bitten him during an argument, and then he probably . . . I'll stop you there. Malaria is caused by a mosquito-borne parasite.
So Ashley isn't a carrier? No, but that didn't stop William Hill offering 7/2 odds on him contracting malaria, making him the favourite celeb to be the next to catch this fashionable, often fatal, disease.
Isn't that a bit crass, considering that malaria is overwhelmingly a disease of poverty? And who else is on the list please? Yes it is, and also on the list are Robson Green (14/1), Dannii Minogue (25/1) and Katie Price (33/1), among others.
Do say: "This year 249,999,998 other people will get malaria, out of a world population of 6.7 billion. Those are the odds we should be talking about."
Don't say: "Twenty quid on Adrian Chiles at 50 to 1, please."
