Malaria, known to humans for millennia, finally has a vaccine

About a year passed between COVID-19’s discovery and the creation of a vaccine. Why was malaria so much harder? The World Health Organization (WHO) recommended a broad rollout for a malaria vaccine after a pilot test showed that it was safe and could be effectively deployed in rural settings. Their historic announcement marks a turning point in the fight against malaria, as the first vaccine to exist for the disease that killed an estimated 400,000 people in 2019 (the most recent year for which updated data is available). Most deaths from malaria occur in sub-Saharan Africa; more than half of those deaths in 2019 were children under the age of 5. The vaccine, dubbed RTS,S/AS01 (RTS,S) and also named Mosquirix, was made by GlaxoSmithKline. According to the pilot study’s results, the vaccine is 30 percent effective in reducing the risk of severe malaria, and 40 percent effective in reducing the risk of...