Last Updated on 05/09/2024 by Arun jain
The first shipment of about 100,000 doses of mpox Vaccines are expected to arrive in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) on Thursday.
The central African country of nearly 100 million people is at the center of an outbreak of mumps that the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a global public health emergency last month.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus confirmed that doses produced by Bavarian Nordic and donated by the European Union were due to arrive on Thursday.
Chris Kasita, head of the DRC’s response to the Mpox outbreak, previously told Reuters news agency about the planned shipment.
“We will receive the first batch on September 5 and the second batch on September 7,” Casita said in a WhatsApp message, without giving further details about the number of doses or the provider.
The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said more than 99,000 doses were due to arrive on Thursday, with a flight from Denmark expected to land at Kinshasa’s international airport at 11:00 GMT.
Another flight with the same number is scheduled to arrive before the weekend.
According to the WHO, more than 17,500 empox cases and 629 deaths have been reported in the DRC since the beginning of the year.
UNICEF says children in the DRC and neighboring countries are most vulnerable to the virus.
“We are in a health war against Mpox. To fight this disease, we need you,” Congolese Health Minister Samuel-Roger Kamba said on X on Tuesday.
Mpox is now done informed In at least 13 African countries, according to an August 27 update from the Africa CDC.
On Wednesday, Guinea said it had reported its first confirmed case of the disease.
This virus has also been found in Pakistan, Philippines, Sweden Thailand.
Other countries have also pledged to send vaccine doses to African countries.
DRC’s Mpox outbreak response chief, Chris Kasita, said the country hopes to begin the first wave of vaccinations on October 8 if the vaccine is delivered this week.
Health authorities face serious logistical challenges with vaccination campaigns, in part because doses must be kept at -90 degrees Celsius (-130 degrees Fahrenheit).
“The vaccine will not be distributed as soon as it is received,” Casita said, explaining why it will take about a month to start the campaign from delivery.
The WHO’s acting director of epidemiology and epidemic prevention, Maria van Kerkhove, said the first people to receive vaccinations were likely to have been in contact with known cases.
The WHO declared an emergency on 14 August due to an increase in cases of the new clade 1b strain.
Both strains – clade 1b and clade 1a – are present in the DRC.
Formerly known as monkeypox, the virus was discovered in 1958 in monkeys kept for research in Denmark. It was first discovered in humans in the 1970s.
Mpox is caused by a virus transmitted to humans by infected animals but can also spread from person to person through close physical contact.
The disease causes fever, muscle aches and skin lesions like large boils filled with pus.
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