Hundreds of thousands of people die from malaria every year. Now a new vaccine could bring the parasite under control.
Loudspeaker Listen to article In the laboratory in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, mosquitoes are being examined – they transmit the parasite. © JB Russell/Panos Pictures/Visa
This article is part of ZEIT am Wochenend, issue 49/2023.
When he first time “the mixer” Halidou Tinto no longer knows. Nor how many times he had been affected by this nasty disease. “Several times!” the parasitologist just shouts and waves him off. In his home country of Burkina Faso, the pattern is the same every time: “Between July and December, when the climate becomes humid, mosquitoes populate the country and transmit the disease. Thousands of people die.” Even those who survive keep the whole family on tenterhooks. “Parents or partners have to fetch medicine and care for the sick, but they can’t go to work. And then there’s no money.”