GSK Begins Planning for Malaria Vaccine Rollout

As one of the world’s largest health concerns, Malaria was responsible for an estimated 409,000 deaths in just one year – with children under five years old accounting for 67% of those deaths.

While we have had medical interventions for malaria for some time, GlaxoSmithKline has recently developed the RTS,S vaccine, also known by the brand name Mosquirix – the first vaccine to protect against a parasite – and which has been backed by the World Health Organisation. The vaccine is designed to speed up the process of acquired immunisation in children, thereby preventing the proportionally higher number of deaths among that cohort.

Now GSK is working hard to mobilise its manufacturing and logistics operations to make sure the vaccine reaches those most in need of it. However, scaling up manufacturing to make millions of doses, organizing national health systems for distributions, and acquiring financial aid from non-profits and other countries is no small task.

“GSK is proud that RTS,S, our ground-breaking malaria vaccine, developed over decades by our teams and partners, can now be made available to children in sub-Saharan Africa and other regions with moderate to high malaria transmission,” said Chief Global Health Officer at GSK, Thomas Breuer. “Both real world evidence and clinical trial data show that RTS,S, alongside other malaria prevention measures, has the potential to save hundreds of thousands of lives.”