Malaria : battle of the merozoites.

The story of Dr. Manuel Patarroyo's struggle to obtain international recognition for his anti-malaria vaccine which attacks the malaria parasite in the second (merozoite) stage of its life-cycle. Now highly drug-resistant, malaria kills an estimated 3 million people throughout the world each year. Dr. Patarroyo (Institute of Parasitology, Bogota, Columbia) identified the proteins on the merozoite that stimulate the body's immune system and synthesized them to produce a vaccine which would be cheap enough to benefit those countries most at risk from malaria and least able to afford expensive medication. Dr. Patarroyo carried out a successful trial on the Columbian Army which suffers badly from malaria, but his efforts to win international recognition for his vaccine met with repeated frustration due to his inability to meet stringent bureaucratic requirements in his applications for MRC-sponsored trials. The film ends with his personal and professional defeat. Since this documentary was made, however, Dr. Patarroyo has obtained MRC co- operation for a major clinical trial in Tanzania and has subsequently obtained recognition for his vaccine from the WHO, to whom he donated it freely, having turned down lucrative offers from commercial pharmaceutical firms. The vaccine, SPf-66, gives an average 40 per cent immunity (77 per cent in small children) and Dr. Patarroyo has achieved his aim of winning recognition for Columbia as a contributor to world health instead of (as has hitherto been the case) always being a recipient of more prosperous countries' medical and scientific aid.