Vaccine progress: HIV, TB, and more

This issue covers many recent advances in the vaccine field: the approval of the first Ebola vaccine, the exciting data on potential vaccine strategies against tuberculosis, and the start of a new HIV vaccine efficacy trial. But amidst all this progress, global cases of measles are on the rise, a disease for which a highly effective vaccine has been available for more than 50 years. Last year more than 140,000 people worldwide died of measles, most of them children under five years old, and 100 million cases of this vaccine-preventable disease were reported, according to the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As this grim statistic shows, the challenge is not only developing vaccines against existing and emerging pathogens, but also ensuring the public health impact of existing vaccines is fully realized.
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