Malaria vaccine trial publishes early results

This month has seen the early results from the on-going Phase III clinical trial of malaria vaccine candidate RTS,S/AS01 come through, and they are promising.

The trial was conducted across 11 sites in seven sub-Saharan African countries.  It has shown that giving three doses of RTS,S/AS01 to children aged 5 to 17 months, reduced the risk of the child experiencing clinical malaria and severe malaria by 56% and 47% respectively.  The results come from the first 6000 children of 8923 in this age category.  Results for younger children, vaccinated at 6 to 12 weeks of age, in addition to formal analysis of vaccine efficacy against death will be available as the study continues.  The results from this study could prove to be highly valuable in the continuing fight against malaria.

The full paper can be read on The New England Journal of Medicine website here, with an accompanying editorial in the same journal from Professor Nick White here.