Carolina was one of a group of people waiting to take part in a clinical trial for a new, experimental malaria vaccine.
There was a turn coming fromReid. She covered the box with a mesh that kept the mosquitoes out but still allowed them to bite. She says it's a Chinese food takeout container. A scientist covered her arm with a black cloth to stop mosquitoes from biting at night.
The feeding frenzy started.
"My arm swelled and I had blisters on it." My family was laughing and asking why I was doing this. She did it multiple times. It was done five times by her.
You might think this is a joke.
It isn't. The University of Washington, Seattle physician and scientist Dr. Sean Murphy is the lead author on a paper about vaccine trials.
Malaria-causing parasites that have been genetically modified are delivered by insects. The body is prepared to fight the real thing even though it has weakened its immune system.
Murphy doesn't plan to use mosquitoes to vaccine millions of people. Malaria vaccines have been delivered by mosquitoes in the past, but they are not very common.
He and his colleagues decided to go this route because it was expensive and time consuming to develop a formula that could be injected. It makes sense to use the parasites for delivery at the proof of concept stage.
The researcher who was not involved in the study says that they went old school with this one. Everything old becomes new again.
She says the use of a genetically modified live parasites is a game-changing innovation.
The vaccine is not ready for prime time. The small trial of 26 people showed that the modified parasites were able to protect some people from a malaria attack.
Murphy thinks this approach could lead to a vaccine that is more effective than the world's first malaria vaccine from Glaxo. It was approved by the World Health Organization last year but has an efficacy rate of less than 40%.
When she joined the trial, she was looking for a job $4, 100 was the first thing that caught her attention. She found a different motivation when she talked to friends who had contracted the disease. She said it wasn't about the money anymore, but about being a part of important research.
Anopheles mosquitoes have parasites in their saliva. Most of the time, the disease is found in Africa where the climate is warm. Malaria can be contracted from the bite of an insect. Malaria parasites can be passed on to mosquitoes by people who have been bitten.
Releasing genetically modified mosquitoes that can't bite or lay eggs is one way countries try to control Malaria.
Scientists estimate there are over two hundred million cases of Malaria a year and over 600,000 deaths, which is why vaccines are needed.
Murphy thinks that the experimental vaccine should cause a stronger immune response than the WHO-approved vaccine. He says that the parasites produce just one out of thousands of proteins.
Some people have tried to make a vaccine from parasites. This is the first time that a team has disarmed with a pair of high tech scissors.
To test how well the approach worked, the other participants had to get another round of mosquito bites.
Seven of the 14 people who were exposed to the disease came down with it, meaning the vaccine was only half effective. Protection lasted less than a few months for seven of the other eight.
When they told me I had Malaria, I cried because I developed a close relationship with the nurses. She didn't want to continue through the trials because of her illness. She was given a drug to get rid of the disease.
The University of Washington Seattle and Seattle Children's Research Institute have an author who thinks they can do better. He and Murphy want to improve the effectiveness of their vaccine by putting it into needles rather than using mosquitoes. For a longer period of time, a higher initial dose could protect you.
Some scientists think that a slightly older version of the parasites could give the body more time to prepare an immune response. The approach is being worked on by the team.
There are other questions that need to be pondered if future trials are promising. What would the cost be for this type of vaccine? The scientists are working with a small company to modify parasites. Investment is required to scale up manufacturing.
Her experience was so positive that she went on to participate in clinical trials for a bird flu vaccine. She will continue to enroll in vaccine trials for the rest of her life.
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