British pharma company GlaxoSmithKline announced on Friday that their vaccine Mosquirix – the world’s first vaccine against the most dreaded vector borne disease in the world has been recommended to be licensed for use on babies in Africa.

But three doses were needed and efficacy dimmed over time, which has led some to question whether the cost of rolling out the vaccine can be justified.

More than 198 million people in sub-Saharans Africa were affected by the disease in 2013 alone and 80 percent of those that die are children under five.

WHO will provide its recommendations on the use of RTS, S by November this year, addressing implementation, cost-effectiveness, and the “public health value” of the vaccine compared to other malaria controls. The vaccine has been recommended for babies in Africa who are right now at quite hike risk of catching malaria.

It means that now the vaccine will by looked at by the World Health Organization.

Sir Andrew Witty, CEO of GSK, said: “Today’s scientific opinion represents a further important step towards making available for young children the world’s first malaria vaccine”.

The vaccine, called RTS.S, or Mosquirix, is not universally effective and its ability to protect from malaria infection begins to fade after a year, but when combined with current efforts such as treated bed nets, researchers think it will be effective at reducing malaria cases and deaths.

Mosquirix was assessed for quality, safety and efficacy under a special procedure that allows the EMA to evaluate a product even if it will not be marketed in the European Union.

The vaccine was tested on over 16,000 children in 8 African nations and 13 research centers.

The results of the final phase showed that 18 months after Mosquirix was administered, malaria cases were reduced by half in children aged 5-17 months and by a third in infants from 6-12 weeks old.

In April, Brian Greenwood of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said it was accepted that Mosquirix was not ideal and not the last vaccine that will be produced in order to fight malaria.

It took more than 30 years for scientists to develop Mosquirix, also known as “RTS, S“.

“Unlike polio or smallpox vaccines, which offer life-long high-level protection from the diseases they are designed to prevent”, explained Reuters recently, “Mosquirix gives only partial protection against malaria, and even that dwindles within a few years”.

GSK and PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative have stated that it will sell the drug at a not-for-profit price.

The vaccine still also has to jump through several regulatory hoops before it can be added to the toolbox against malaria in Africa.