Advertisement As vaccines against COVID-19 are rolled out around the world, a group of researchers has been working on a groundbreaking vaccine for a different deadly disease. Streptococcus A (strep A) is a bacterial infection that kills more than 500,000 people every year. Streptococcus bacteria kill half a million people worldwide every year. There is no vaccine to protect against strep A, but researchers from the Griffith University Institute for Glycomics believe they have developed one. Lead researcher Manisha Pandey said the team developed a vaccine by combining two proteins from the bacteria with an adjuvant, a substance that stimulates an immune response from the body.