BANGKOK, Dec 6, 2006 (AFP) - The World Health Organization on Wednesday called for more access to vaccines for life-threatening diseases such as yellow fever, influenza and hepatitis B in developing nations.
"There can be a 20 year delay between the introduction of some vaccines in the United States and Europe and in developing countries," said Marie-Paule Kieny, director of the initiative for vaccine research at the World Health Organization (WHO).
"That is why there is the focus now," she told a WHO forum here, adding that expanding access to vaccines to the developing world was a major public health challenge.
The WHO forum, which brought together 200 researchers, scientists and public health experts from around the world in Bangkok, also discussed ways to increase immunization in the developing world.
It also called for sharing research among the 200 health experts on the development of new vaccines including those for HIV and malaria.
Kieny said an HIV vaccine could be available as soon as 2009 and immunization against malaria could be a reality by 2011.
One promising candidate for a malaria vaccine, RTSS, was recently shown effectively to immunize children in Mozambique against the disease, said Regina Rabinovich, director of infectious diseases at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, at the forum.
"I cannot overestimate what a big step it was to find the RTSS did have a measurable impact against the parasite in children. That has never been seen before," Rabinovich said.
"A malaria vaccine is something that is a global priority," she said.
Trials for an HIV vaccine are also progressing, the WHO said.
Thailand, host of the WTO forum, has enrolled 16,000 patients in its trial, the final phase of which is expected to be completed in 2009, according to Supachai Rerks-Ngarm, lead investigator of the country's HIV study.
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