Children to benefit from 'milestone' malaria vaccine

The world's first malaria vaccine has cleared one of the final hurdles prior to being approved for use in Africa.

The European Medicines Agency gave a positive scientific opinion after assessing its safety and effectiveness.

"Kids in Africa will benefit from it," said Joe Cohen, co-inventor of the vaccine 'mosquirix'.

"The target population is kids under the age of 5."

The vaccine will not stop malaria, but will add onto the benefits of other prevention measures, said Dr Fatoumata Nafo-Traore, executive director of the "Roll Back Malaria Partnership".

"It is an important achievement and we appreciate the positive feedback," she added.

Malaria kills around 584,000 people a year worldwide, most of them children under five in sub-Saharan Africa.