WORLD’S FIRST MALARIA VACCINE!
Treatment could save 400,000 lives every year
THE first vaccine to combat killer malaria is being rolled out in nations hardest hit by the dangerous disease — but experts warn the four-dose jab may not eradicate the life-threatening illness!
Caused by parasites transmitted through bites of infected mosquitoes, malaria kills 400,000 people worldwide every year and sickens 200 million more.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), Africa accounts for nearly 94 percent of malaria cases and deaths — but 67 percent of global fatalities occur in children aged five and under. The United States has about 2,000 infections annually, but the nation’s past is riddled with malaria epidemics dating back to the colonies.
The flu-like symptoms of malaria include muscle aches, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea.
But in October, WHO approved the protein-based RTS,S/AS01 vaccine — also known as MosquirixTM — which is said to have at least a 75 percent efficacy rate.
But, experts warn the ever-evolving parasites may challenge the effectiveness of the preventive measure.
Harvard University professor Dyann Wirth explains P. falciparum — the most common of the five malaria-causing parasites — has roughly 5,300 genes “that it can use to evade anything the host can throw at it.”
Solomon Conteh, a molecular virologist with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious
Diseases, insists, “You cannot depend on one vaccine, but you can use multiple vaccines to target different life stages of the parasite. So if you have a parasite that is resistant to a vaccine in one stage, you can target it at another stage.”
Conteh, who is part of a team developing additional jabs, adds, “The RTS,S vaccine targets parasites before they can infect the liver, but this is just one stage of the parasite’s complex life cycle.”