Transmission facility for human malaria parasites

Although the incidence of malaria has decreased greatly over the past twenty years, malaria remains one of the deadliest infectious diseases worldwide. Recently this decrease in incidence has stalled, owing to insecticide resistance in mosquitoes and the development of resistance to nearly all antimalarials by the parasite, to the point where the number of annual infections has changed very little in recent years. To further reduce malaria incidence, new approaches and new interventions are required. Blocking transmission of the parasite from man to mosquito has become an important focus of new interventions. We will establish a facility where human malaria parasites can be transmitted to mosquitoes and onwards to mice that is open to all members of the research community to facilitate research into compounds and vaccines that can block transmission. This will open up new avenues of research and innovation to accelerate our fight against malaria.