ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the possibilities and rationale for generating vaccines against the parasite, effective malaria vaccines cannot alone solve a worldwide problem, which extend from primary health care and the generation of new chemotherapeutic and prophylactic drugs, to insecticidal and biological control measures against the mosquito vector. Malaria is the disease caused by parasitic protozoa of the genus Plasmodium and transmitted to the vertebrate host by the bite of the infected female Anopheles mosquito. A major and often fatal complication of infection with P. falciparum is cerebral malaria, in which capillaries in the brain become blocked due to sequestration of late trophozoites. The invasion of erythrocytes by malaria merozoites is initiated via surface receptors on the merozoite interacting with ligands on the erythrocyte surface. The effects of such a vaccine on reduction of malaria transmission would vary according to the duration and level of immunity and the intensity of transmission.
