The drug reduced the number of new infections in the infants by 65 percent, in a three month period, it was found. Investigators say the vaccine also reduced the number of infants who became critically ill by 35 percent.
Dr. Pedro Alonso, of the Manhica Health Research Center, Mozambique said, "This finding needs to be corroborated further in other trials, but this observation might be important in the clinical development plan of this vaccine."
If all goes as well as expected, GlaxoSmithKline, the manufacturer of the drug, plans to apply for regulatory approval, which could make the vaccine available within the next five years.
The three-shot vaccine regimen would be given to infants and children at the same time they receive other routine vaccinations against childhood illnesses.
The prototype vaccine RTS,S could be the first vaccine to shield against a disease that has claimed on a yearly average 800,000 children under the age of five in Africa.
RTS,S uses proteins taken from the malaria-causing Plasmodium falciparum parasite and fuses them into a tested hepatitis B vaccine, AFP reports.
The new vaccine protects an individual against hepatitis and primes the immune system to recognize P. falciparum after the parasite reaches the liver, where it matures and proliferates.
Malaria kills more than one million people, each year, and sickens 350 million others. Most of the victims are small children and infants in Africa, where the mosquito-borne illness is endemic.
The results of the malaria vaccine trial are published in the British medical journal The Lancet.
