Danielle Sessa

Imagine that there is a small fire in your kitchen. You first try to put it out with a towel. When that does not work, you douse it with water, only to see the flames grow. Finally, you leave home and call the fire department. By the time they arrive, the fire has spread throughout your home and reached the neighbor’s house. Pandemics spread similarly. Preventing them, and preparing for them, carries a lower cost than rebuilding once the disease has already spread and lives have been lost.

Drokas Dako is a health worker and mother from the Ségou region of Mali. During malaria season, she is out the door at 7 a.m. She walks kilometers, often in heavy rain, to ensure that all the children in her village have received their dose of a medicine to protect them from malaria — a deadly and common disease in her region. Preventing malaria with seasonal campaigns Malaria claims the lives of around619,000 people annually worldwide, according to the latest data from 2021.

Children drinking seasonal malaria medicines. Photo by: Toby Madden / MMV When the World Health Organization recommended widespread use of the first malaria vaccine last year, the news reinvigorated the fight against this deadly disease. The RTS,S vaccine has been many years in the making, between development timelines and subsequent field evaluations prior to the WHO recommendation.