Thought this was worth a thread. Incredible breakthrough by researchers at Oxford in the UK, the KEMRI Wellcome Trust in Kenya, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Novavax, the Serum Institute of India, and the Institut de Recherche en Sciences de la Sante in Nanoro, Burkina Faso (which has a very high malaria burden). The vaccine was shown to be about 77% effective in preventing malaria infections in infants and toddlers in a medium sized phase III trial in Burkina Faso, which is far more effective than an earlier vaccine. A larger phase III trial begins shortly.
The vaccine utilizes a protein antigen that mimics the protein from the parasite (transmitted by mosquitos) that causes malaria to "trigger" the immune system to be ready to fight the parasite; it also uses the exact same adjuvant (a chemical known to enhance vaccine activity) from Novavax used in their COVID vaccine. Derek Lowe has an excellent blog entry on the new vaccine, including the detailed science involved in the production of the vaccine and how it works, linked below.
https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2021/04/23/great-malaria-vaccine-news
I knew the malaria problem was big, but I had no idea just how big until I just looked it up. As per the World Malaria Report, "there were 229 million cases of malaria in 2019 compared to 228 million cases in 2018. The estimated number of malaria deaths stood at 409 000 in 2019, compared with 411 000 deaths in 2018." Most of these cases are in children. If this can prevent the vast majority of infections and also decrease the severity of infections, it will be an accomplishment on the order of the COVID vaccines, especially given how long malaria has been such a terrible plague.
https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-...:~:text=Disease burden,411 000 deaths in 2018.
The vaccine utilizes a protein antigen that mimics the protein from the parasite (transmitted by mosquitos) that causes malaria to "trigger" the immune system to be ready to fight the parasite; it also uses the exact same adjuvant (a chemical known to enhance vaccine activity) from Novavax used in their COVID vaccine. Derek Lowe has an excellent blog entry on the new vaccine, including the detailed science involved in the production of the vaccine and how it works, linked below.
https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2021/04/23/great-malaria-vaccine-news
I knew the malaria problem was big, but I had no idea just how big until I just looked it up. As per the World Malaria Report, "there were 229 million cases of malaria in 2019 compared to 228 million cases in 2018. The estimated number of malaria deaths stood at 409 000 in 2019, compared with 411 000 deaths in 2018." Most of these cases are in children. If this can prevent the vast majority of infections and also decrease the severity of infections, it will be an accomplishment on the order of the COVID vaccines, especially given how long malaria has been such a terrible plague.
https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-...:~:text=Disease burden,411 000 deaths in 2018.