A SPOROZOITE-BASED VACCINE FOR THEILERIA-PARVA

East Coast fever, which is caused by Theileria parva infection in catt le, is of major economic importance in eastern and central Africa. Unt il recently, the only available method of immunization against East Co ast fever was the infection with live sporozoites and simultaneous tre atment with a long-acting oxytetracycline, This method has two major d isadvantages: (1) it uses live organisms; and (2) the immunity engende red is parasite strain specific. In this article, Antony Musoke, Vishv anath Nene and Subhash Morzaria review the progress made in developing an alternative method of immunization based on a defined sporozoite a ntigen.