By CHRISTABEL LIGAMI, Special Correspondent
In Summary
- The updated 2013 Malaria Vaccine Technology Roadmap indicates that the world should aim to have licensed vaccines that reduce malaria cases by 75 per cent, and are capable of eliminating it by 2030.
Global Malaria experts and partners have agreed
on a new approach for developing vaccines capable of reducing malaria
cases by 75 per cent, and eliminating it.
The new Malaria Vaccines Roadmap will target next
generation products by 2030. The updated 2013 Malaria Vaccine Technology
Roadmap indicates that the world should aim to have licensed vaccines
that reduce malaria cases by 75 per cent, and are capable of eliminating
it by 2030.
It comes in addition to the original 2006
Roadmap’s goal of having a licensed vaccine against Plasmodium
falciparum malaria — the most deadly form of the disease — for children
under five years in sub-Saharan Africa by 2015.
“Safe, effective, affordable vaccines could play a
critical role in defeating malaria,” said Robert Newman, director of
the World Health Organisation’s Global Malaria Programme adding that
“despite all the recent progress countries have made, and despite
important innovations in diagnostics, drugs and vector control, the
global burden of malaria remains unacceptably high.”
The new roadmap aims to identify where additional
funding and activities will be particularly key in developing second
generation malaria vaccines both for protection against malaria disease
and for malaria elimination.
These include next-generation vaccines that target both Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax species of malaria.
“The new vaccines should show at least 75 per cent
efficacy against clinical malaria, be suitable for use in all
malaria-endemic areas, and be licensed by 2030.
The roadmap also sets a target for malaria
vaccines that reduce transmission of the parasite,” said Jean-Marie Okwo
Bele, director of WHO’s department of Immunisation, Vaccines and
Biologicals.
Reason for the update
The 2013 Malaria Vaccine Technology Roadmap cites
several reasons for the update, among them: changing malaria
epidemiology associated with the successful scale-up of malaria control
measures in the past decade; a renewed focus on malaria elimination and
eradication in addition to the ongoing need to sustain malaria control
activities and new technological innovations since 2006 including
promising early work on so-called transmission-blocking malaria
vaccines.
The most recent figures by WHO indicate that
malaria causes an estimated 660,000 deaths each year from 219 million
cases of illness. In East Africa, WHO indicates that 16 to 18 million
malaria cases are reported every year and more than 300,000 deaths.
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