The practicality and sustainability of vaccination as an approach to parasite control

The development of a successful vaccine depends not only on the production of the vaccine itself, but also on the design pf the vaccination programme. This involves a better understanding of the epidemiology of the disease to be controlled, the delivery system to be used and the costs involved. This review focuses on current understanding of parasite population dynamics and epidemiology, and on the logistic experience gained from immunization programmes using existing viral and bacterial vaccines. The feasibility and sustainability of any new vaccine would greatly benefit from research into epidemiology and health systems which are conducted in parallel, rather than sequential to, vaccine development.