Mosquirix: The world’s first malaria vaccine
Malaria is a parasitic disease responsible for over 400,000 deaths every year, most of which are in Sub-Saharan Africa.
On the 6th October, the WHO gave a nod of approval to Mosquirix, which is a vaccine against malaria developed by GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). The vaccine reduces the likelihood of developing severe malaria by 30%.
When I was reading about this development, I thought to myself — “Huh? Only 30%! — that’s not too great then.” And chances are, you, dear reader, have been thinking the same thing. But the fact of the matter is, it is a big deal. Severe malaria has a mortality rate of 20 and 90% for hospitalised persons and people who chose to remain at home, respectively. So, in spite of its low efficacy rate — the vaccine, coupled with antimalarial drugs, has proven to cause as much as a 70% reduction in hospitalisation or death.
Furthermore, the WHO has found that the vaccine has “a strong safety profile” — which it backs up with the fact that (as of its recommendation on 6th October) over 2.3 million doses of the vaccine have been administered, without any observable dangerous side effects for the majority— proving that it is safe.
Of course, that won’t stop people from opposing the vaccine. Which is why I am eternally grateful that Malaria is not a disease that plagues America as much as it does other countries — if it were, well, you can imagine what would happen (hint: “personal freedoms” would take priority over the safety and wellbeing of people).
I digress. My point is, the development (and WHO recommendation) of a malaria vaccine is great news, especially for Sub-saharan Africa, which accounts for more than 87% of all the deaths caused by malaria.
In addition, the icing on the cake is that the vaccine was developed in Africa by African scientists. This is hugely significant because it is a testimony of Africa’s rapid development in the last few decades, and it gives hope for the future.
What is even more encouraging is that another vaccine being developed against malaria developed by scientists at the University of Oxford in Britain has shown a 77% efficacy rate in its early trial stages. However, many malaria vaccines have shown a good efficacy rate in pre-clinical studies, but very few have worked well in the field — which suggests that perhaps the parasite that causes malaria — Plasmodium, has mechanisms to evade immunity, in which case it is highly unlikely that any vaccine will ever provide a great deal of protection.
There are yet more challenges in the fight against malaria — for one, Mosquirix requires as many as 4 doses and its protection wears off after several months. The latter (the wearing off of protection) is thought to be caused by a compromise in the dendritic cell functions by Plasmodium — which prevents the dendritic cells from carrying out their role of building long-lasting immunity in the body.
Furthermore, the question of funding still remains unanswered as the world focuses on the fight against Covid-19.
These challenges, among many others, explain why it took us so long to develop an effective vaccine against malaria.
In spite of these challenges, however, it is important to appreciate that we have succeeded in developing a vaccine for malaria in the first place, and to recognise how important the vaccine is in “building our armoury of weapons” against malaria.
Credits
“Malaria Vaccine” by theglobalpanorama is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0
