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A malaria vaccine developed by researchers at the University of Oxford’s Jenner Institute had up to 77 percent efficacy in a small clinical trial among children in Burkina Faso. The findings, posted as a preprint last week (April 20), represent the highest efficacy of any vaccine for the disease, although some researchers have cautioned that more data are needed before drawing firm conclusions about just how well it works.
The study results are “very positive news,” Pedro Alonso, the director of the World Health Organization (WHO) Global Malaria Programme, who was not involved in the work, tells Science. The trial only included 450 children, he adds. “We are still quite far away from having the type of information that would allow us to get very excited.”
Malaria kills more than 400,000 people each year. Most of those deaths are in Africa, and most are among young ...
