The World Health Organization has praised Malawi, a small landlocked nation in southeastern Africa, for introducing a pioneering vaccine against malaria, a disease that kills hundreds of thousands across Africa each year, mostly children, the statement from the organization said on Tuesday
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 23rd April, 2019) The World Health Organization has praised Malawi, a small landlocked nation in southeastern Africa, for introducing a pioneering vaccine against malaria, a disease that kills hundreds of thousands across Africa each year, mostly children, the statement from the organization said on Tuesday."WHO welcomes the Government of Malawi's launch of the world's first malaria vaccine today in a landmark pilot programme. The country is the first of three in Africa in which the vaccine, known as RTS,S, will be made available to children up to 2 years of age," the organization said.
WHO added that Ghana and Kenya would introduce the vaccine in the coming weeks.
"We have seen tremendous gains from bed nets and other measures to control malaria in the last 15 years, but progress has stalled and even reversed in some areas. We need new solutions to get the malaria response back on track, and this vaccine gives us a promising tool to get there," WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
According to Ghebreyesus, the malaria vaccine has the potential "to save tens of thousands of children's lives."
According to the data from WHO, there is a risk of malaria transmission in at least 100 counties. African Region still holds over 90 percent of the global malaria burden.
Over 250,000 children in Africa die of this life-threatening disease which is common for many tropical and subtropical areas, the group stressed. Globally, the disease kills over 430,000 people a year.
