Every year Malaria affects approximately 225 million people all over the world and kills approximately 781,000 most of whom are children.
The politics of malaria research funding
Although malaria affects so many people all over the world and kills a significant number of the most vulnerable, malaria has for a long time not been the “in” disease; a disease for which those who fund research into finding cures for diseases have been prepared to spend their money. For instance, although malaria has been in existence long before HIV/AIDS came to the limelight, it has been superseded by HIV/AIDS for research funding into the eradication of the disease.
The indubitable reason is that malaria is a disease of the poorest of the poor. Malaria is endemic in those countries of the world that, coincidentally, happen to be the poorest areas of the world. Thus, unlike HIV/AIDS, malaria has not caused the same amount of deaths of people in the countries from which research funding money derives, as HIV/AIDS has.
This being so malaria, until recently, has not had in its camp any lobbyists in the corridors of power in the rich countries to galvanize support for its eradication. Those who have perished to malaria have thus been virtually invisible. It is for this reason that the recent announcements respecting possible vaccines for malaria are cause for restrained and cautious celebration.
The vaccine against the Malaria parasite
In October of this year, GlaxoSmithKline, which had commenced the third stage of trials of a prototype for a malaria vaccine called RTS,S, reported that their prototype had been effective in cutting to half the risk of contracting malaria.
Recently, researchers at the UK’s Sanger Institute also reported a breakthrough in their efforts to develop a vaccine that according to them would be completely effective in defeating the disease. The scientists at the Sanger Institute announced the discovery of proteins on the surface of both red blood cells and the plasmodium parasite that made it possible for the parasite to identify its target blood cell and then invade it. According to the scientists, the next step is to develop a vaccine that would interrupt the link between the proteins on the parasite and red blood cell, by attacking the protein on the parasite.
The viability of a malaria vaccine
For several decades the United Nations and other NGOs have focused on preventative measures, like spraying insecticides and providing nets to malaria prone areas of the world, to reduce the incidence of malaria infection. Some observers have commented that while vaccination may be the solution in those areas of the world where the incidence of malaria is low to moderate, the same cannot be said for those areas of the world where the incidence is moderate to high.
According to them, in these latter areas of the world, for example in sub-Saharan Africa, the complete eradication of malaria may be an elusive goal. These observers note that the focus on developing a vaccine is thus wrong because it detracts from preventative measures that will be needed in these areas even when a vaccine is developed.
The real issue – the politics of pharmaceutical monopoly
While the viability of an eradication program maybe questionable, the real concern for policy makers should not be the pros and cons between eradication and preventative approaches, but the ease of access to any vaccine or drug that would eventually be developed.
Those on the frontline of medicine in the developing world, like Doctors without Borders, know first hand that many people die in the developing countries because of the lack of access to affordable pharmaceuticals. The poorest of the poor cannot afford the cost of drugs and so they die; they die because it is costly to keep them alive.
Will any vaccine that will be developed for malaria be affordable? The track record of the pharmaceutical companies suggests otherwise. For those countries where malaria is endemic, the prospects of eradicating malaria may be elusive because they may not be able to afford the vaccine when it is developed.
For such countries, preventative measures will continue to play an important role for some time even after the development of a vaccine. It is thus important that the development of a vaccine does not disrupt the control measures that have by and large proven effective to reduce the occurrence of the malady.
References
Ellen F.M. ‘t Hoen, The Global Politics of Pharmaceutical Monopoly (Diemen, AMB, 2009)
Andrew Farlow, The Science, Economics and Politics of Malaria Vaccine Policy, - A submission to the UK Department for International Development and The Malaria Technology Roadmap and Response to the Tremonti Report to the G8 Finance Ministers, April 2006
Edmund Kwaw - Edmund Kwaw is a freelance writer and the Founder and Executive Director of the Gift of Music Foundation; a Canadian Private Foundation ...
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