Malaria vaccine

Malaria vaccine

Context:

• Recently Cameroon in Africa became the first country in the world to launch the RTS, S malaria vaccine for children into its routine national immunisation services.
• According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the rollout follows a malaria vaccine pilot programme in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, as efforts gather pace to improve vaccination against the disease in high risk areas.
• Twenty countries aim to roll out the vaccination drive this year, according to GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, and other outfits which aim to provide equal access to new and underused vaccines for children living in the world’s poorest countries.
• According to the WHO’s World Malaria Report 2023, it is Africa that bears the highest malaria burden, accounting for 94% of cases and 95% of global malaria deaths in 2022.
• India in 2022, accounted for a staggering 66% of malaria cases in the WHO South­East Asia Region.
• According to the above report India and Indonesia accounted for about 94% of all malaria deaths in the WHO South­East Asia Region.
• Despite a 55% reduction in cases since 2015, India remains a significant contributor to the global malaria burden.
• The Health Ministry said that over the past 15 years, India has made progress in reducing the country’s malaria burden.
• India has a vision for a malaria­free country by 2027 and elimination by 2030.

Who funds the vaccine?

• The current rollout is part of a UNICEF initiative where the contract for the first­ever supply of a malaria vaccine was given to British multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology company GSK.
• The vaccine acts against Plasmodium falciparum which is the most deadly malaria parasite globally.

How does the dose work?

• According to the WHO the vaccine should be provided in a schedule of four doses in children from around five months of age.
• It further adds that a 5th dose, given one year after dose 4, may be considered in areas where there is a significant malaria risk remaining in children a year after receiving dose 4.

About Malaria:

• It is a serious disease caused by a parasite which infects a certain type of mosquito.
• Most people get malaria from the bite of an infective mosquito.
• Anopheles mosquitoes are the type of mosquito that transmit malaria from one person to another person.
• Not all Anopheles mosquitoes have malaria, but if they bite a person with malaria, they can become infectious and transmit the same.
• Once they bite another person, this continues the cycle of spreading malaria from mosquito to people.
• Malaria can be a deadly disease if not diagnosed and treated quickly as per time.