The first vaccination campaign against malaria

Malawi is the first country to launch a malaria vaccination campaign, with a pilot project that will also cover other countries such as Kenya and Ghana.

The vaccine, called RTS,S, will be available to children from the age of two.

The aim of the pilot project is to achieve the immunisation of about 360,000 children in the three pilot countries within one year.

It is a very important and ambitious project, despite some limitations: in a previous study, in fact, the effectiveness of the vaccine prevented malaria infection in 4 out of 10 cases.

“It's an imperfect vaccine but it still has the potential to save tens of thousands of lives”, said Dr Alister Craig.

Malaria is an infectious parasitic disease carried by mosquitoes of the Anopheles genus.

Plasmodium is transmitted to humans through the bite of an infected mosquito.

Malaria causes more than 435,000 deaths a year, most of them in children under 5, who are the most vulnerable.

Due to the increasing resistance of mosquitoes to insecticides and of plasmodia to drugs, there is an increasingly urgent call for research into new means of preventing malaria transmission.

The first vaccination campaign against malaria is an important step in the history of medicine, which will contribute to the fight against one of the biggest health challenges in the world.

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