New UK vaccine could reduce child malaria deaths

'Exciting' new malaria vaccine could be produced for just a few dollars a dose

FILE - A baby from the Malawi village of Tomali is injected with the world's first vaccine against malaria in a pilot program, in Tomali, Dec. 11, 2019. As the World Health Organization announces Thursday July 21, 2022 the next step in its rollout of the world's first authorized malaria vaccine in several African countries, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation says it will no longer financially support the shot. (AP Photo / Jerome Delay, File)Show less

A new malaria vaccine could contribute towards drastically reducing the number of children who die from the infection, experts suggest.

A study reports on the effectiveness of a malaria booster vaccine created by Oxford researchers and shows long-lasting high efficacy in African children, meeting the World Health Organisation's specified 75 per cent goal.

A vaccine booster dose given one year after children received three doses as their primary vaccination regime maintained high efficacy against malaria.

“I think this is really exciting. People have been trying to make malaria vaccines for over a century," said Adrian Hill, director of the Jenner Institute and Lakshmi Mittal and Family professor of vaccinology at the University of Oxford.

“The first clinical trial was in 1940s — 140 different malaria vaccines have been into arms to see if the world can make a vaccine that is useful against malaria.

“We think these data are the best data yet.

“And very importantly, this is a vaccine that we think can be manufactured and deployed, very widely.”

Prof Hill said the vaccine could be produced for a few dollars a dose, and together with existing measures, such as mosquito nets and sprays, could help to save children’s lives.

Malaria vaccine to be introduced in Africa - in pictures

Health officials administer the world's first vaccine against malaria in Malawi in December 2019. AP

Parents wait for their young children to receive the Mosquirix vaccine. AP

A baby from the village of Tomali is injected with the vaccine. AP

A nurse holds malaria vaccine vials at the Lumumba Sub-County Hospital in Kisumu, Kenya. Reuters

A nurse prepares to tend to a child with malaria at Marcory General Hospital in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, on October 7, 2021. Reuters

“There’s $3 billion dollars being spent on other interventions, but we definitely don’t want to withdraw those or malaria will go back up rapidly," he said.

“We want to add a malaria vaccine on top of nets, on top of spraying, on top of drug preventive treatment.

“And if we can do that, and do it at a grand scale, we really could be looking at a very substantial reduction in that horrendous burden of malaria deaths and disease in the coming years, certainly by by 2030.

“That’s our goal, to make a big impact, maybe a 70 per cent reduction in deaths. We think that could well be feasible.”

“We hope that this will be deployed and available and saving lives, certainly by the end of next year."

The WHO estimates that malaria caused more than 640,000 deaths in 2020 and progress in reducing the mortality has stalled in recent years.

Most deaths are among children in Africa, where very high transmission rates are found in many countries.

Researchers reported new findings from their Phase 2b trial after the administration of a booster dose of the candidate malaria vaccine, R21/Matrix-M.

It had previously demonstrated high-level efficacy of 77 per cent against disease over the following 12 months in young West African children in 2021.

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The trial was conducted at the Clinical Research Unit of Nanoro at the Institut de Recherche en Sciences de la Sante in Burkina Faso.

A total of 450 children aged five to 17 months were recruited from the catchment area of Nanoro, with 409 receiving the booster.

The youngsters were randomly assigned to three groups, with the first two groups receiving the R21/Matrix-M vaccine, with either a low dose or high dose, as a booster, and the third a rabies vaccine as the control group.

Each child received the same booster vaccination as their primary series of vaccinations.

Doses were administered in June 2020, largely before the peak malaria season.

The study reports a vaccine efficacy of 80 per cent in the higher-dose group, and 70 per cent in the lower dose adjuvant group, over 12 months of follow-up.

Twenty-eight days after the booster dose, antibody levels were restored to similar levels as those following the primary vaccinations.

No serious adverse effects were noted in relation to the vaccine.

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“It is fantastic to see such high efficacy again after a single booster dose of vaccine," said Prof Halidou Tinto, regional director of the institute in Nanoro and the principal trial investigator.

“We are currently part of a very large Phase 3 trial aimed at licensing this vaccine for widespread use next year.”

Prof Hill said: “We are delighted to find that a standard four-dose immunisation regime can now, for the first time, reach the high efficacy level over two years that has been an aspirational target for malaria vaccines for so many years.

Gareth Jenkins, director of advocacy at Malaria No More UK, said: “Today’s R21 vaccine results from Oxford’s renowned Jenner Institute are another encouraging signal that, with the right support, the world could end child deaths from malaria in our lifetimes.

“But for new British inventions to achieve their potential, British leadership must continue, not least at the imminent US-hosted Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria replenishment conference this September.

“This will be the new PM’s first foreign policy test. For the sake of millions of children’s lives, global health security and British relations with its closest ally, it’s a test they cannot fail.”

The findings are published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.