THE QUEST FOR A MALARIA VACCINE: CLEARING THE AIR

Abstract

Malaria has continued to be a life-threatening scourge predominantly in sub-Saharan Africa. Attempts to eradicate it in the past as failed and it is now re-emerging, at a very fast rate, in areas hitherto not known to inhabit the parasite. 40 % of the global population is at risk of malaria, with around 300 million persons, mainly children of 6 months to 5 years, suffering from malaria yearly. This situation is made possible by loop-holes in global malaria control programme; excruciating poverty; population movements; conflicts; environmental and climate changes. Malaria parasites are becoming resistant to drugs and mosquitoes are showing resistance to chemical means of control. Recognizing the failures of past initiatives, and in the light of emerging data on the potentials of vaccines in a sustained attack on malaria, malaria vaccine is increasingly being embraced as a solution to the menace of malaria. Presently, no malaria vaccine is licensed, but with funding from the Wellcome Trust in the U.K., and from the U.S., as well as grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, research has reached a heightened peak and vaccine candidate, targeted at one or more stages of the Malaria parasite’s life-cycle and could interfere successfully with infection, and parasitemia in the host or vector, or even block the manifestations of clinical disease, are currently in different trial stages and leading to a successful development of a vaccine for malaria. In reviewing the different malaria vaccine candidates presently under development, we can conclude, based on data on percentage efficacy, that the RTS, S/AS02A - a pre-erythrocytic vaccine remains the leading candidate towards our search for a malaria vaccine.