Drug and vaccine development.

Some of the activities in chemotherapeutic research and vaccine development which WHO has initiated, participated, coordinated or funded are reviewed. WHO has interests in research, particularly, although by means exclusively, in all the communicable diseases and in applied vaccinology. Examples are given from various fields including progress in human trials of anti-sporozoite vaccines in malaria due to Plasmodium falciparum, chemotherapeutic studies on artemisine and halofantrine, pragmatic and systemic approaches to vaccination in leishmaniasis, recent work on the chemotherapy of leishmanial infections, African leishmaniasis and Chagas' disease, the anticipated impact of ivermectin in onchocerciasis control, studies on new macro- and microfilaricides, progress in the diarrhoeal diseases control programme, and the control of taeniasis/cysticercosis, ascariasis and hookworm through different delivery systems using population-based chemotherapy.