The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) hopes to receive the first doses of vaccines against the COPD epidemic next week in a country where the disease has already caused at least 570 deaths, the health minister said on Monday.
The most affected country, the DRC, has recorded 16,700 cases, “with just over 570 people dying” since the start of the year, Minister Samuel-Roger Kamba said at a press conference.
“We have two countries basically that have promised us vaccines. The first country is Japan. And the second country is the United States of America,” he said.
The United States has promised 50,000 doses, while “Japan signed this morning (Monday) with the authorities for 3.5 million doses, only for children,” explained an official of the response cell on condition of anonymity.
A country of around one hundred million inhabitants, the DRC “plans to vaccinate 4 million people including 3.5 million children,” added this source.
“I hope that next week we could already see the vaccines arriving. […] “Our strategic vaccination response plan is already ready, we are just waiting for the vaccines to arrive,” the minister insisted.
The disease “affects more and more young people. And we have many children under the age of fifteen who are affected,” he said.
The current outbreak is characterized by a more contagious and dangerous virus, with an estimated mortality rate of 3.6%.
The resurgence of mpox in the DRC, which also affects Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda, prompted the World Health Organization (WHO) to trigger its highest level of alert at the international level on Wednesday.
The DRC is the focus and epicentre of the current outbreak, with the spread of a more dangerous strain of the virus causing growing concern in Africa and beyond.
Outside Africa, cases of MPOX have been diagnosed in Sweden, Pakistan and the Philippines.
Formerly called monkeypox, the virus was discovered in 1958 in Denmark, in monkeys bred for research. Then in 1970 for the first time in humans in what is now the DRC (formerly Zaire).
MPOX is a viral disease that spreads from animals to humans but is also transmitted through close physical contact. The disease causes fever, muscle aches and skin lesions.
“Do not eat the meat of dead animals, do not touch sick animals, because this is also a way of becoming contaminated,” said Minister Kamba.
WHO recommendations
The WHO on Monday recommended that countries affected by the new variant of the coronavirus that has recently emerged in Africa launch vaccination plans in areas where cases have emerged.
WHO recommends that they, among other things, “initiate plans to advance smallpox vaccination activities.” […] in areas where cases have emerged (i.e. where the disease has occurred within the previous two to four weeks), targeting people at high risk of infection (e.g. contacts of cases, including sexual contacts, children, health care workers and care staff).”
Regarding international transport, WHO recommends “establishing or strengthening cross-border collaboration agreements regarding surveillance and management of suspected cases of mpox, communication of information to travelers and transport companies.”
But this must be implemented “without resorting to blanket restrictions on travel and trade that would have an unnecessary impact on local, regional or national economies,” she stresses.
WHO also calls on affected countries to establish or strengthen emergency response coordination mechanisms at national and local levels, to strengthen disease surveillance and detection, differentiating between clades, and to report cases to it “in a timely manner and on a weekly basis.”
She further urges them to improve research, combat stigma associated with the disease and improve the skills of health workers on MPOX while providing them with personal protective equipment.