SINGAPORE — A highly-anticipated vaccine being developed for dengue that is in the advanced stages of clinical trials is not effective against the strain that is dominant in Singapore, said Environment and Water Resources Minister Vivian Balakrishnan yesterday.

Referring to the drug being developed by French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi Pasteur, the minister said that while it showed some promise for Type 3 and 4 dengue, it is only about 50 per cent effective against Type 1 — the dominant strain here — and 35 per cent effective against the next most common strain here, Type 2.

“Those rates of efficacy are not, in my opinion, good enough,” said Dr Balakrishnan.

However, the authorities are studying the feasibility of using Wolbachia-carrying male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to suppress the dengue virus-carrying mosquito population, he said.

An advisory panel consisting of international and local experts has been appointed to provide scientific advice on the safety and effectiveness of this technique in the Singapore context, said Dr Balakrishan, who stressed that “unless it is clear that safety is totally assured”, there will be no field trials.

More than 12,000 dengue cases have been reported here this year, leading to questions about whether the Sanofi drug will be made available, despite mixed results in the latest study conducted among more than 10,000 children aged between two and 14 in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Noting that efforts have been stepped up to curb the number of breeding sites — more than 1.9 million inspections have been conducted and more than 1,000 Gravitraps deployed this year — Dr Balakrishnan stressed that the community still had to play its part to combat dengue.

“We can have 850 National Environment Agency officers and 1.9 million inspections, but it is not possible for officers to be everywhere all the time. This is where I really require the assistance of home owners, contractors, town council officers and even Members of Parliament. It does make a difference,” he added.

Nevertheless, Dr Balakrishnan said it was worth considering some of the calls that have been made to enhance penalties.

Suggestions mooted in the House yesterday included pegging penalties to the size and scale of the mosquito breeding ground, or publishing the list of pest control companies looking after sites that were found to have mosquitoes breeding.