Malaria candidate vaccine reduces Malaria by approximately one third

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The multicounty malaria vaccine trial that included 6537 children aged between 6 to 12 weeks has proved to be protective only for about 30% .These findings came as a dissapointment because this study was one of the most promising large scale phase III vaccine trial.

The RTS, S malaria candidate vaccine that was expected to protect African children from malaria has shown an unacceptably low protection level. However, the investigators found that, in addition the vaccine reduces episodes of severe Malaria among infants for about 26% up to 14 months after the babies immunised.

The results of this trial were presented at the International African Vaccinology conference in South Africa and simultaneously the New England journal of Medicine (NEJM) published the results.

Dr.Salim Abdulla one of the investigators from Ifakara Health Institute in Tanzania  said that  "and we should may be thinking of first generation vaccine that is targeted only for certain children".

On the other hand, Blaise Genton from Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute in Basel, Switzerland that the vaccine might work better at some trial sites than the average reported today.

Despite these results, many scientists acknowledged that this trial has a greater contribution to the science of Malaria Vaccine; also the intensive cooperation of African research centres towards working successfully in this trial was congulatulated. However WHO could not commend anything on these results because the study is yet to be finalised.The study is scheduled to be completed in 2014.