Wouldn’t it be a game-changer if, during your lifetime, we finally saw an end to the scourge of Malaria? Some time ago, I remember visiting a rural medical clinic in southern Tanzania. The director there was sharing some of the problems she faced on an ongoing basis. The most dreaded enemy? Malaria. 17,000 deaths per year in her tiny little clinic. No wonder she was miserable. So this vaccine offers promise…
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/08/08/health/malaria-vaccine/index.html?iref=allsearch
but of course, we still have a long way to go. As Brigada Participant, Stephen pointed out, “there’s a LOT of work to do to scale it up for real production. Right now they’re manually dissecting every mosquito by hand to create the vaccine.” And check out the other problems…
http://edition.cnn.com/video/?/video/health/2013/08/09/brf-malaria-vaccine-test-problems-moss.cnn
But one Brigada reader pointed us to the “Kite” patch, which is already approved by the US FDA and can already make you virtually invisible to those nasty flying darts. (Thanks David!)
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/kite-patch
As a matter of fact, the Kite Patch has now officially become the most successful Indiegogo campaign of all time — the most money, and the most active. People are excited about this stuff because they’ve seen the devastation that Malaria can cause. I can’t WAIT for the end.
Your opinion? Already using a tool that has virtually brought suffering to an end in your region? Optimistic about the cure? …skeptical? Leave your opinion by clicking on “Comment” following the online version of this item using the link below.
“Breakthrough?” That’s serious overstatement. “Important step forward?” would be closer to the truth.
As a missionary physician serving in a country that is malaria-endemic, I’ve followed news stories of malaria “breakthroughs” for years, and have developed a fairly skeptical attitude. Hundreds of malaria vaccines have been tested. This one requires multiple intravenous injections! That is not a promising basis for a mass vaccination program. That will provide protection to the fortunate few who can get it, but won’t protect whole populations. Those of us old enough to remember getting the sugar cube with the pink drop of oral polio vaccine at our local fire station have a perspective on mass vaccination! Thousands of people received it in the period of a few hours, and the scene was repeated all across the country, and the entire nation was protected within a matter of a few weeks.
But as a step forward, this is good news. Progress in medicine tends to be cumulative. What is learned from this research will feed into future projects, a move us toward control, if not eradication of this nasty disease.