GlaxoSmithKline's RTS,S malaria vaccine entered its final phase of pre-approval testing last week in Bagamoyo, Tanzania, raising hopes that the drug could be licensed for widespread use by 2012.
On 26 May, five infants aged 5–17 months were inoculated with the vaccine. In the coming months, the study will become the largest ever trial of a malaria vaccine candidate, involving 16,000 children under the age of two at eleven sites in seven African countries.
RTS,S is so far the only malaria vaccine to make it to phase III trials, in a development process that has taken more than two decades and cost over US$400 million (see Nature 451, 1042–1046; 2008).
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Malaria vaccine enters phase III clinical trials. Nature 459, 627 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/459627c
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/459627c
