Malaria vaccine for Africa

  1. Posted on Thursday 13 November 2008 - 08:53
    Sam Banda Junior
    Image of Sam Banda Junior
    Sam Banda Junior, AfricaNews reporter in Blantyre, Malawi
    A malaria vaccine trial on children in Africa starts next month researchers have said. The medical trial will take place on about 16,000 children and has come about as the researchers try to create the world's first malaria vaccine. Malaria kills more than one million children yearly in Africa.
    school children
    The vaccine trials are expected to take place in such countries as Burkina Faso, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania.

    Malaria is one of the diseases which is killing more people especially children in Africa and is caused by parasites and spread by mosquitoes.

    The British drug-maker GlaxoSmithKline PLC is teaming with the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, which is an anti-malaria charity funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, clinics and research centres in Africa to develop a malaria vaccine, according to the NewsDay.com report.

    “This is probably going to be one of the largest studies in infants and in children in Africa,” said Joe Cohen, a top vaccine researcher for GlaxoSmithKline. He added that the trial would commence next month.

    The Director of the Malaria Vaccine Initiative, Dr. Christian Loucq, said the project has been working over the past year to upgrade laboratory, computer and other equipment in those countries, train technicians, and even help develop local equivalents of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ensure the trials are properly monitored.

    According to the report, the Malaria Vaccine Initiative has so far spent US$107 million on the project but has not yet calculated how much more it will spend. GlaxoSmithKline has spent $300 million so far, and estimates it will spend up to $100 million more.

    Researchers working on the trial said in an interview in Johannesburg, South Africa that much of the groundwork already has been laid in preliminary trials involving 4,000 children conducted since 2003.

    The researchers further said that even if their vaccine does not succeed, the widespread investment needed to conduct the trials means that Africa will be left with better communications, research and other infrastructure that could be used in the search for vaccines against other diseases such as HIV/Aids.

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