The Roll Back Malaria Secretariat welcomes the announcement by three major supporters of the global malaria vaccine development effort to join hands. A vaccine has been a much awaited tool to fight malaria with. Even though we have, today, interventions which are quite effective against malaria such as insecticide treated bednets to prevent malaria, antimalarial drugs and intermittant treatment strategies to reduce the impact of malaria during pregnancy, the burden of malaria, particularly in Africa is unacceptably high. This is because poor people who are at greatest risk of malaria have limited access to these interventions and because of an increasing resistance of malaria to antimalarial drugs. Improving access to the existing interventions is a major goal being pursued by the Roll Back Malaria partnership. This includes accessing drugs within a short time for people who get sick with malaria - and this is difficult in places where the health care infrastructure is weak. Bednets still need to be re-treated regularly with insecticides for them to remain effective, although long lasting nets are about to be introduced. Given the environment in which malaria thrives, an effective malaria vaccine will provide an additional and a highly cost effective tool to the repertoire of interventions that we have today.

Progress in the development of a vaccine against malaria has been slow, largely on account of the small financial investment in this work. The past few years have seen the funding for malaria vaccine development increase, even though it is still far short of what is called for by the huge burden of disease due to malaria. The coming together of the three main international donors who support this work will be a major step in the right direction. The malaria vaccine field will benefit much from a concerted action in taking the many potential vaccine candidates to development and testing. This is very much in the spirit of the Roll Back Malaria partnership.

Access the Press Release regarding this announcement from the Malaria Vaccine Initiative at path web site.