WHO recommends first Antimalarial vaccine

• Integrity Education, Delhi
• 07, Oct 2021

• The WHO recommends the use of the RTS,S/AS01 (RTS,S) malaria vaccine among children in subSaharan Africa and in other regions with moderate to high P. falciparum malaria transmission.
• The WHO’s recommendation was based on the results from an ongoing pilot programme in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi.
• Malaria remains a primary cause of childhood illness and death in subSaharan Africa, according to the WHO.

Malaria Disease

• Malaria is a mosquito-borne disease caused by a plasmodium parasite that commonly infects a certain type of mosquito (female Anopheles mosquitoes) which feeds on humans.
• Children aged under 5 years are the most vulnerable group affected by malaria.
• There are 5 parasite species that cause malaria in humans, and 2 of these species – P. falciparum and P. vivax – pose the greatest threat.
• In 2018, P. falciparum accounted for 99.7% of estimated malaria cases in the WHO African Region 50% of cases in the WHO South-East Asia Region, 71% of cases in the Eastern Mediterranean and 65% in the Western Pacific.
• P. vivax is the predominant parasite in the WHO Region of the Americas, representing 75% of malaria cases.