Malaria vaccine shows promise
20th August 2013
By Guest Writer
Maryland-based Sanaria’s PfSPZ vaccine contains live parasites and is complicated to make because it requires scientists to dissect the salivary glands of mosquitoes to get at the parasites that cause malaria.
These sporozoites are then weakened so they cannot cause illness and are incorporated into a vaccine, which must be injected into a person’s veins several times, with each shot about a month apart.
A test of the same vaccine two years ago that administered it into the skin of patients showed protection in only two of 44 volunteers.