EYE Strategy April Newsletter
 Yellow fever vaccine arriving in Venezuela, April 2022 April EYE Strategy NewsletterThe new series of the ‘EYE on Yellow Fever’ podcast is here!
How do at-risk countries prepare to Country UpdatesOutbreak response Venezuela     1,800,000 doses of yellow fever vaccine arrived in Venezuela in April 2022 as part of the agreement between the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the government, for the prevention of yellow fever outbreaks in the regions of the Americas. These vaccines are intended for populations within states deemed to be of medium epidemiological risk, such as Aragua, Carabobo, Barinas, Mérida, Portuguesa, Trujillo, Cojedes and Lara. It is estimated that more than 5,700,000 people will be vaccinated between 2022 and 2023. This is the first of three deliveries of the yellow fever vaccine to the country in 2022. To read the article in full, click here. Ghana  Ghana has successfully interrupted a yellow fever outbreak that affected a wide geography in the north and central part of the country. The outbreak was marked by its impact on under-served and nomadic sub-populations in remote and rural areas. Our partners, UNICEF Ghana, have produced a film about the yellow fever vaccination campaigns earlier this year in response to an outbreak in the Savannah Region, which sadly caused almost 50 deaths, including children. UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO) were among the partners supporting the Ghana Health Service with a series of campaigns aimed at reaching close to 1,000,000 people in over 70 districts in nine regions. Thanks to funding from the International Coordinating Group on Vaccine Provision (ICG), supported by Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, yellow fever vaccines were provided, and advocacy efforts helped to increase the number of people vaccinated and reduce the spread. Click here to view the film. Uganda At a glance: On 6th March 2022, the WHO received notification from the Uganda Ministry of Health of four suspected yellow fever cases. As of 25th April 2022, a total of seven suspected cases tested positive for yellow fever antibodies by plaque reduction neutralization test. However, further investigations identified only one confirmed case of yellow fever reported from Wakiso district, Central Region (the other cases had been protected by past vaccination and did not have compatible symptoms). The Ministry of Health notified WHO aligned to International Health Regulations (IHR) 2005, and a rapid response team was deployed to the affected districts. Due to the potential of epidemic spread in Uganda and the risk of spread to neighbouring countries, WHO assesses the risk to be high at the national and regional levels. To read the full DON, click here. In parallel, Uganda is progressing with plans to introduce yellow fever vaccination into the routine immunization programme in late May 2022 and starting a multi-year preventive mass vaccination campaign (PMVC) towards the end of this year. This will mark a significant step towards protecting all children against yellow fever. Preventive mass vaccination campaigns (PMVCs)Nigeria Further yellow fever vaccination campaigns are planned in Nigeria in the states of Ogun and Gombe. Implementation is expected in June 2022 (exact dates to be confirmed) and will aim to protect 8.8 million people. Additional PMVCs will be implemented in the latter part of 2022 in the states of Kano, Adamawa, Bayelsa, Borno, Bayelsa and Enugu.  Yellow fever vaccination campaigns in Nigeria from 2017 to 2021. PMVC (preventive mass vaccination campaign) RVC (reactive vaccination campaign) An infographic has been developed by the World Health Organization in conjunction with the EYE Strategy to tell the story of yellow fever in Nigeria and can be accessed here.  Sudan The implementation of the yellow fever catch-up campaigns in the remaining ten states of Sudan is scheduled for June 2022, pending confirmation of the dates from the Sudan Ministry of Health. The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) The yellow fever PMVCs in Maniema, Sankuru, and South Kivu are moving forward with micro-planning, however there may be a delay to implementation. Further yellow fever PMVCs are planned in Lomami, Kasai, East Kasai and Central Kasai for October 2022. Overall, the campaigns will aim to protect around 15 million people. Congo The Congo government is planning the integration of the yellow fever PMVCs with measles and rubella immunization activities, but a final decision is still pending. Activities are due to commence on 27th May 2022. These campaigns will cover all areas except Pointe Noire (since it was already protected in 2018). Further information will be provided in due course. Meet the partners Dr Elias Ekokobe Forbin - Consultant, yellow fever epidemiology & surveillance, health operations. Elias is a medical doctor and has an Master of Public Health (MPH), focused on epidemiology and biostatistics streams from the University of Melbourne and an MSc in Health Informatics from City University of London. Elias started his career as a field epidemiologist during the 2015 Ebola response in Guinea, working for Save the Children and then, WHO. He has supported disease surveillance systems in several other emergency settings including the 2017 Pneumonic plague outbreak in Madagascar, the 2018 Ebola epidemic in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the 2020 Rift Valley Fever outbreak in Mauritania. Elias has also supported Pacific Island Countries in preparing and responding to COVID-19. Elias joined the yellow fever Incident Management Support Team (IMST) in Ouagadougou in March as a surveillance officer and is also guiding health operations.  Dr Hadiatou Diallo - Consultant yellow fever vaccination & health operations. Hadiatou is a medical doctor and has a Master's degree in International Public Health from Senghor University, Egypt. She started her career with WHO as a national consultant for the response to the 2015 poliovirus cVDPV epidemic in Guinea. She then collaborated successively with UNICEF as national vaccination officer, and has supported COVID-19 response, working with USAID-Guinea and Agence de Médecine Préventive in Cote d'Ivoire. To date, she has a wide range of experience in immunization, specifically in the development of strategies and systematic approaches to immunization and vaccine safety. Hadiatou joined the IMST in Ouagadougou in January 2022 as vaccination officer and is also supporting the health operations as deputy. EventsGavi application deadlines for 2022 Read more about the Gavi Independent Review Committee here: https://www.gavi.org/our-support/irc  Webinar Guidelines for preparedness, readiness, and response planning for yellow fever outbreaks in urban settings Rapid urbanization and increasing population movements mean an increasing risk of large urban outbreaks of yellow fever with potential for international spread. In order to mitigate urban risk, the EYE Strategy has commissioned the development of guidelines for effective management of yellow fever urban outbreaks through the development of robust preparedness, readiness and response plans. Dr Peter Mbondji has developed these guidelines with wide consultation across the EYE network, and will be hosting this webinar to launch them to our international yellow fever network. Date: Thursday, 2nd June 2022 If you are not on our mailing list and would like to join this webinar, please email us at Training The International Coordinating Group (ICG) on Vaccine Provision was established in 1997 as a mechanism to manage and coordinate the provision of emergency vaccine supplies and antibiotics to countries during major outbreaks. This course examines foundational understanding of the ICG and its mechanism to access the emergency vaccine stockpile for Ebola, Yellow Fever, Cholera and Meningitis. You can access the course here: https://openwho.org/courses/introduction-icg-and-mechanism Article: Yellow Fever and Fractional Vaccine Doses Extract: Members of the EYE initiative knew that to fully demonstrate that fractional dosing of yellow fever vaccine is safe and offers appropriate protection, randomized controlled trials would need to be performed. They called upon African researchers to complete this work—enter Kimathi and his team. Kimathi works with a consortium of investigators from the University of Oxford, MSF/Epicenter, Institut Pasteur de Dakar, Uganda Virus Research Institute and the KEMRI-Wellcome Trust. Amazingly, 96.7% of patients were retained throughout the study and followed up a year after vaccination. Additionally, the results of the study were outstanding. All results demonstrate that the fractional doses were non-inferior to full doses. At 28 days after immunization, nearly all participants showed neutralizing antibodies at levels far higher than the minimum protective threshold of 1:10. These levels remained high a year after vaccination. To read the full article, click here. |
Episode 1 – Urban outbreaks: a global risk
