The fight against the dreaded scourge malaria has received a boost with the manufacture of a vaccine to combat the illness spread by the bite of the female Anopheles mosquito. Around 6,19,000 fatalities were reported globally on account of malaria with around 20,000 in India in 2021, according to the World Health Organization.
A malaria vaccine being manufactured by the Poonawallas’ Serum Institute of India (SII) has been granted full national licensure for use in Ghana by the country’s Food and Drugs Authority, noted a press release on SII’s website. "This marks the first regulatory clearance for (the R21/Matrix-M vaccine) for use in any country… SII is the manufacturing and commercialization license holder for the vaccine developed by the University of Oxford with leveraging technology from Novavax,” stated the press release.
"The vaccine has been approved for use in children aged five to 36 months, the age group at highest risk of death from malaria. It is hoped that this first crucial step will enable the vaccine to help Ghanaian and African children to effectively combat malaria.” The note stated that the vaccine "has demonstrated high levels of efficacy and safety in Phase II trials, including amongst children who received a booster dose of R21/Matrix-M at one year following a primary three-dose regime.” The vaccine is said to be of a low dosage that can be manufactured at mass scale and modest cost, enabling as many as hundreds of millions of doses to be supplied to African countries.
SII’s chief executive officer Adar Poonawalla stated that "Developing a vaccine to greatly impact this huge disease burden has been extraordinarily difficult. At SII, we are committed to our vision of Health for All and ensuring equitable access to vaccines for people around the world.” SII was founded by his father, Dr Cyrus Poonawalla.
The current Covid strain is mild and five to six million Covovax doses have already been produced, stated Adar. He told reporters that "just for precautionary measures, elderly people can get the booster dose, but it would be their choice whether or not to take it. We will also produce the same amount of Covishield doses in the next two to three months,” noted Business Standard on April 22, 2023.
The number of active cases of the infection stand at 4,222 as on May 31, according to the website of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India.