That’s true, the population estimates used in the models James cites are dominated by the agricultural era. But the claim that half of deaths are due to malaria is based on the contrary assumption that most humans lived in subsaharan Africa.
Here is some commentary on the two most popular models.
Given population growth, it’s not obvious to me that more people lived until 5k years ago than since then.
That’s true, the population estimates used in the models James cites are dominated by the agricultural era. But the claim that half of deaths are due to malaria is based on the contrary assumption that most humans lived in subsaharan Africa.
Here is some commentary on the two most popular models.
Go and look at the estimates. They have already been made and are easily found with the usual method.