The World Health Organization (WHO) announced on Friday that nearly one million doses of mpox vaccine have been allocated to nine African countries as part of an effort to control the rising spread of the virus across the continent. This distribution is facilitated by the recently established Access and Allocation Mechanism (AAM), designed to ensure fair and rapid access to mpox vaccines in Africa.

Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO’s Director-General, highlighted the importance of these allocations, noting that over 50,000 people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Rwanda have already received vaccinations. This progress has been made possible by donations from the United States and the European Commission.

The urgency of vaccine distribution follows alarming data from the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), which reported a significant 500% increase in mpox cases across 19 African countries compared to last year. This increase is attributed to the emergence and spread of a new mpox strain, clade 1b, which originated in the DRC and has since spread to neighboring regions.

Dr. Tedros emphasized that the current allocation of around 900,000 vaccine doses is based on pressing public health needs, especially in areas experiencing notable transmission of the new variant. The WHO declared mpox a global health emergency in mid-August to heighten global awareness and prompt a more unified response to this escalating crisis.

Source:https://www.africanews.com/