INDEPTH Chairman comfirms funding for malaria studies

Dr Seth Owusu-Agyei, Chair of the INDEPTH Board of Trustees and Director of the Kintampo Health Research Centre in Ghana, was among more than 300 malaria scientists and policy makers at the Malaria Forum in Seattle. As reported by Associated Press in Seattle, Seth Owusu-Agyei said: "Funding for malaria is gaining momentum. Some years back you couldn't even get money for research. If that momentum grows over time, and people get the money to do more work, we will transform control to eradication," said Seth Owusu-Agyei, an epidemiologist with the Kintampo Health Research Centre in Kintampo, Ghana.

Owusu-Agyei led a team that recently completed a successful small trial of a new malaria vaccine for children developed by GlaxoSmithKline. Study results were released Wednesday in a paper published online in The Lancet.

The vaccine was found to be safe for infants and 35 percent effective in preventing new infections over a six-month period in infants. The same vaccine was found to be 45 percent effective among children age one to four.