New way to stop falciparum malaria transmission

26/12/2019 0 Comments read Health & Science

By Neena Bhandari

SYDNEY, 26.12.19 (SciDev.Net): Australian scientists have successfully blocked the deadliest malaria parasite —- Plasmodium falciparum — in its transmission stage, paving the way for developing preventative therapies to stop the spread of the disease.

Lead researcher Justin Boddey from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research and University of Melbourne says, “We have built on our previous studies, where we identified in the P. falciparum parasite an enzyme called plasmepsin V, an enzyme essential for the parasite to grow inside red blood cells. We showed that if you inhibit the enzyme’s activity then you can kill the parasites as they are growing in red blood cells.”

The new findings (opens in new tab), published 18 December in Cell Reports, show that plasmepsin V is also essential in a subset of parasites called gametocytes (sexual form of the malaria parasite) that transition to infect the mosquito. Continue reading →

Samoa measles death toll rises amid vaccine scare

03/12/2019 0 Comments read Health & Science

By Neena Bhandari

Sydney, 03.12.2019 (SciDev.Net): Fifty-three people, including 48 children under the age of four years, have died of measles in the small Pacific island nation of Samoa, which is facing the worst outbreak of this highly contagious disease driven by low vaccination levels.

Samoa’s Prime Minister Tuilaepa Lupesoliai Neioti Aiono Sailele Malielegaoi announced on Monday (2 December) that all branches of government, except water and electricity departments, will be closed on Thursday and Friday this week and civil servants will be redeployed to help in the mass immunisation drive to vaccinate everybody up to the age of 60 years.

The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates Samoa’s total population immunity to be as low as 31 per cent. To prevent measles outbreaks, it is recommended that countries should aim to achieve and sustain at least 95 per cent immunisation coverage.

Continue reading →

New dengue vaccine effective in clinical trials

12/11/2019 0 Comments read Health & Science

By Neena Bhandari

Sydney, 12 November 2019 (SciDev.Net): An experimental dengue vaccine has proved 80.2 per cent effective against virologically-confirmed dengue among children and teens aged 4—16 years in the 12 months after a second dose, according to results of phase 3 clinical trials.

“A vaccine with this kind of efficacy could have a substantial impact on public health,” says Derek Wallace, contributor to the trial results, published 6 November in The New England Journal of Medicine. According to the WHO, dengue is one of the top 10 threats to global health, infecting nearly 400 million people and killing up to 25,000 people worldwide annually. There is no specific treatment for the mosquito-borne viral disease, which causes flu-like symptoms, joint and muscle pain and, in severe cases, leads to haemorrhagic fever and death. It is now endemic in more than 100 countries, with Asia shouldering 70 per cent of the disease burden.

“Our dengue vaccine candidate, TAK-003, is based on a live-attenuated dengue serotype 2 virus (DENV-2), which provides the genetic ‘backbone’ for all four vaccine serotypes,” Wallace, head of the global dengue programme of the Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited(opens in new tab), which developed the vaccine, tells SciDev.Net.

Continue reading →