Malaria vaccine protects against severe malaria 7 years after vaccination

The malaria vaccine RTS,S provides sustained protection against severe malaria 7 years after immunization, according to extended findings from a phase 3 trial published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases. Initial results of the phase 3 study demonstrated the efficacy of RTS,S (GlaxoSmithKline) against severe and clinical malaria among children over a 3- to 4-year follow-up period, and in July 2015, the vaccine received a “positive regulatory assessment” from the European Medicine Agency, researchers noted. In April of this year, WHO launched a pilot malaria vaccine program using RTS,S in three African countries. However, a previous phase 2 single-center study demonstrated a decrease in protection over a 7-year period — from 35.9% to 4.4% — among children aged 5 to 17 months who received three doses, researchers noted. In the current study, researchers investigated malaria incidence up to 7 years following vaccination in an open-label extension study of the initial phase 3 trial, which included infants aged 6 to...