BY: VITALIS UGOH, Calabar
Women in Cross River state, Nigeria have joined others across the World to herald the new malaria Vaccine.
It would be recalled that malaria had killed millions of mothers and their babies several decades ago.
There has been several attempt by scientists and pharmaceutical companies to come out with an acceptable vaccine until date.
Based on the new Vaccine, our reporter carried out a vox pop on this break through as it affects women and their babies
Here them expressing their joy and happiness over the new of malaria Vaccine. First to speak is a mother of two children, Mrs Atim Asuquo who exclaimed with joy over this discovery
She described as the “best news in the year 2021” and urged the federal government to as a matter of urgency begin to map out plans to get the Vaccine down to Nigeria.
“I can’t wait to break the news. God has helped African women and their children as they are the worst hit,”, she added.
Also speaking, Blessing Ajimoya expressed joy over tge news and advised our government to go for tge vaccine as quickly as possible. Malaria, she said, had claimed so many lives in the World especially.
Ajimoya said, ” this is the time for mothers to be happy as malaria will no longer going to be sleeping again in the hospitals with their babies over and over again”.
Madam Grace Obinna a mother of four, described the news as a blessing from God. Mothers and their babies have lost their lives in millions following malaria parasite but thank God there now a vaccine to fight it from the onset.
Obinna(Mrs) called for mass production of the vaccine so that it can get to the remotest part of the World especially Africa.
Mrs. Lucy Eki Ayaya, a mother of two, said she is happy over the global break through on malaria Vaccine. This good news to us mothers in Africa and other developing world. Actually, malaria kills more than Hiv/AID. This discovery is great and needs to be commended especially the pharmaceutical company that made this possible.
The world’s arsenal against malaria just got a fancy new bazooka. But it’s not the easiest weapon to deploy, it only hits its target 30 to 40% of the time, and it’s not yet clear who’s going to pay for it.
The weapon in question is the RTS,S vaccine from GlaxoSmithKline, which on Wednesday got the green light from the World Health Organization for widespread use.
This is not only the first authorized malaria vaccine, it’s also the first vaccine ever approved for use against a parasitic disease in humans.
The recommendation comes after RTS,S showed positive results in a pilot program in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi. The vaccine cut malaria cases by 40% and reduced hospitalizations of the potentially deadly disease by nearly a third.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO’s director general, called the approval of RTS,S a historic moment.
“The long-awaited malaria vaccine for children is a breakthrough for science, child health and malaria control,” he said.
RTS,S won regulatory approval from the European Medicines Agency back in 2015 but WHO wanted to wait for the results of this latest pilot program before recommending it for use in countries with moderate to high levels of malaria transmission.
The expectation is that it will be used primarily in sub-Saharan Africa, where the mosquito-borne disease is one of the top killers of children, claiming nearly a quarter of a million lives each year.
Already in Nigeria, Breakthrough Action, Nigeria and USAID is currently on advocacy on Malaria and Tuberculosis (TB) in Cross River and few other states in Nigeria.
