Effects of climate variability on malaria transmission in southern Côte d'Ivoire, West Africa (Publications)
variables and malaria transmission in Côte d’Ivoire. We used the VECTRI model to predict malaria transmission in southern Côte d’Ivoire. First, we tested the suitability of VECTRI in modeling malaria transmission [...] Malaria continues to be a major public health concern with a substantial burden in Africa. Even though it has been widely demonstrated that malaria transmission is climate-driven, there have been very [...] rate (EIR) from the VECTRI model was well correlated with the observed mal...
Sporozoite immunization: innovative translational science to support the fight against malaria (Publications)
'sporozoites,' 'malaria,' and 'vaccines.' EXPERT OPINION: First generation (radiation-attenuated) PfSPZ vaccines are safe, well tolerated, 80-100% efficacious against homologous controlled human malaria infection [...] INTRODUCTION: Malaria, a devastating febrile illness caused by protozoan parasites, sickened 247,000,000 people in 2021 and killed 619,000, mostly children and pregnant women in sub-Saharan Africa. A highly [...] effective vaccine is urgently needed, especially for Plasmodium...
Bridging the gap from molecular surveillance to programmatic decisions for malaria control and elimination (Publications)
An increasing number of molecular and genomic assays are available to study malaria parasite populations. However, so far they have played a marginal role in informing policy and programmatic decision-making [...] the origin of imported infections and characterize transmission chains in settings with very low malaria transmission, and using serology to monitor recent and past exposures in low-transmission settings [...] integrate molecular and genomic data into control program decision-making,...
<em>Plasmodium falciparum</em> merozoite surface protein 1 as asexual blood stage malaria vaccine candidate (Publications)
INTRODUCTION: Malaria represents a tremendous public health challenge in tropical and sub-tropical regions, and currently deployed control strategies are likely insufficient to drive elimination of malaria. Development [...] Development and improvement of malaria vaccines might be key to reduce disease burden. Vaccines targeting asexual blood stages of the parasite have shown limited efficacy when studied in human trials conducted [...] as one of the most promising approaches to provide immune...
Development of WHO recommendations for the final phase of elimination and prevention of re-establishment of malaria (Publications)
that all affected countries work toward the elimination of malaria, even those still experiencing a high burden of disease. However, malaria programs in the final phase of elimination or those working [...] and quality-controlled malaria guidelines. The WHO convened an external guideline development group to formulate recommendations for interventions to reduce or prevent malaria transmission in areas with [...] with very low- to low-transmission levels and those that have eliminated malaria....
Malaria rapid diagnostic tests reliably detect asymptomatic <em>Plasmodium falciparum</em> infections in school-aged children that are infectious to... (Publications)
this study, malaria rapid diagnostic tests (mRDT), light microscopy (LM) and quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) were used to evaluate their performance detecting asymptomatic malaria infections [...] BACKGROUND: Asymptomatic malaria infections (Plasmodium falciparum) are common in school-aged children and represent a disease transmission reservoir as they are potentially infectious to mosquitoes. To [...] was 31.7% by qPCR, 18.2% by mRDT and 9.4% by LM. Approximately one-third (31.2%)...
The first case series of malaria overlapped with COVID-19 in Iran (Publications)
detection of malaria was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Case finding was dramatically decreased with the onset of coronavirus, thereby causing a spurt in malaria incidence. Moreover, the malaria treatment [...] Introduction: Although indigenous malaria cases have dramatically declined over the past decades, the COVID pandemic has continued to affect the programs designed to combat malaria, particularly in those countries [...] normal in some cases, but they were mistakenly treated as...
Development and evaluation of PlasmoPod: a cartridge-based nucleic acid amplification test for rapid malaria diagnosis and surveillance (Publications)
Malaria surveillance is hampered by the widespread use of diagnostic tests with low sensitivity. Adequate molecular malaria diagnostics are often only available in centralized laboratories. PlasmoPod is [...] cross-reactivity with other pathogens common in malaria endemic regions was observed. In a cohort of 102 asymptomatic individuals from Bioko Island with low malaria parasite densities, PlasmoPod accurately detected [...] independent cohort, using dried blood spots from malaria symptomatic...
