Nigeria, eight others get 899,000 Mpox vaccine

The Access and Allocation Mechanism for Mpox has allocated an initial 899,000 vaccine doses to nine countries, including Nigeria, across the African region, which have been hard-hit by the current Mpox surge.

This was disclosed in a joint press statement issued by the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday.

The statement noted that, in collaboration with affected countries and donors, the decision aims to ensure that the limited doses are used effectively and fairly, with the overall objective of controlling the outbreaks.

It said the AAM principals from Africa CDC, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, UNICEF, and the World Health Organisation approved the allocation, following the recommendations of an independent Technical Review Committee of the Continental Incident Management Support Team for Mpox.

The statement added that the decision was informed by country readiness and epidemiological data.

The nine countries are the Central African Republic, Côte d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Liberia, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, and Uganda. The largest number of doses—85 per cent of the allocation—will go to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as the most affected country, reporting four out of every five laboratory-confirmed cases in Africa this year.

These doses come from Canada, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, the European Union (Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Cyprus, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, and Spain), as well as the European Union Health Emergency Response Authority, and the United States of America.

The outbreak of Mpox, particularly the surge of the viral strain clade Ib in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and neighbouring countries, was declared a public health emergency of international concern by WHO and a public health emergency of continental security by Africa CDC in mid-August.

This year, 19 countries in Africa have reported Mpox, many of them newly affected by the viral disease. The epicentre of the outbreak remains the Democratic Republic of the Congo, with over 38,000 suspected cases and more than 1,000 deaths reported this year, it highlighted.

It stressed that vaccination is recommended as part of a comprehensive Mpox response strategy, also focusing on timely testing and diagnosis, effective clinical care, infection prevention, and the engagement of affected communities. Vaccines play an important role and are recommended to reduce transmission and help contain outbreaks.

“In recent weeks, limited vaccination has begun in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda. This allocation to the nine countries marks a significant step towards a coordinated and targeted deployment of vaccines to stop the Mpox outbreaks.

“For most countries, the rollout of Mpox vaccines will be a new undertaking. Implementing targeted vaccination requires additional resources. Partners of the Mpox AAM, set up last month, are working to scale up the response. Further allocations of vaccines are expected before the end of the year,” it stated.

On vaccine availability, it said over 5.85 million vaccine doses are expected to be available to the Mpox Vaccines AAM by the end of 2024, including the nearly 900,000 allocated doses.

“The supply includes contributions from multiple nations and organisations, including 1.85 million doses of MVA-BN from the European Union, United States, and Canada, 500,000 doses of MVA-BN from Gavi utilising the First Response Fund, 500,000 doses procured through UNICEF, as well as a further 3 million doses of the LC16 vaccine from Japan,” it noted.

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