The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced today, Wednesday, that China succeeded in clearing its territories from malaria after a struggle against the disease that ran for 70 years.
The disease claimed the lives of more than 400 thousand people in 2019.
Most of the causalities were Africans according to Western media outlets.
Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the WHO, congratulated the Chinese people on clearing the country of malaria.
He indicated that China joins an increasing number of countries that were able to get rid of the disease.
He assured that the target of the free world from malaria is attainable within the near future.
It is worth noting that researchers at Oxford University have developed the most efficacy vaccine against malaria in the world.
According to the Daily Mail, a UK daily newspaper said that the new vaccine, called R21 / Matrix-M, is estimated at 77% after 12 months of follow-up.
The research team hopes the anti-malaria vaccine may be authorized within the two years to come in the light of velocity and deduced lessons the anti-corona vaccines.
Adrian Hill, Director of Jenner Institute at Oxford University said the malaria vaccine achieves great advantages if it is authorized.
He affirmed that the researchers are very confident in the effectiveness of the vaccine to provide sufficient protection against the disease.
Head of the WHO assured that China’s success is a result of decades of concentrated sustainable efforts.
It is worth mentioning that China registered 30 million with malaria in the 40s of the 20th century.
But China did not register any local infection throughout the last four years.
Countries that did not register infections within three consecutive years could submit to the WHO to get a certificate to prove the clearness of malaria.
Such countries should provide authentic evidence that they are able to prevent local infection with malaria in the future.
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