Meningitis spreads amidst vaccine shortage
Pastor Dale Morgan
Meningitis spreads amidst vaccine shortage*
13 Mar 2007 18:55:34 GMT
Source: IRIN
OUAGADOUGOU, 13 March (IRIN) - Despite recent appeals for assistance,
health authorities in Burkina Faso say they still lack vaccines to help
stem a meningitis epidemic that has already claimed more than 400 lives,
mostly children.
"We did everything but we still do not have the vaccine doses," said
Sylvestre Tiendrebeogo, a director of the Ministry of Health. "We need
3.5 million doses to cover all the health districts and above all [the
capital] Ouagadougou. It is important that we launch a vaccination
campaign for all to prevent the epidemic from spreading to all the cities."
Health authorities so far have registered 4,958 cases of meningitis and
432 deaths. This compares with 3,636 cases and 399 deaths during the
same period last year.
Tiendrebeogo said the government had 500,000 available vaccines when the
epidemic began early this year. It appealed for funds to purchase
vaccines in February and this week urgently requested 1.3 million
vaccines from the International Coordination Group on Vaccine Provision
for Epidemic Meningitis Control (ICG) to launch a mass vaccination
campaign in Ouagadougou and other affected districts.
"We're in the meningitis season. It's not unusual that there is this
number of cases and we've already had quite a few number of requests for
vaccines from the ICG," said Gregory Hartl, a spokesman for the World
Health Organisation (WHO) in Geneva. "There will likely be more requests
as time goes on."
WHO helped establish the ICG to ensure rapid and equal access to
vaccines and medicine to treat the illness after large outbreaks of
meningitis in Africa in 1995 and 1996. The ICG also includes Medecins
Sans Frontieres, the United Nations children's agency (UNICEF) and other
agencies and nongovernmental organisations.
Tiendrebeogo said efforts were underway to work with WHO so that the 1.3
million vaccines requested could be delivered this week. Hartl said
countries that request vaccines usually receive them "relatively fast
but it depends on logistics" in each particular country.
"We witness children passing away every day," said Desire Ilboudo, who
lives on the outskirts of Ouagadougou where the epidemic has it. "You do
not hear that they are sick, you just hear a mother's strident cries and
you know that something bad had happened."
Health officials have urged family members of patients to stay away from
admission rooms at clinics and hospitals to help avoid further spread of
the disease. MSF has set up tents on the grounds of Pissy hospital on
the outskirts of Ouagadougou to screen potential new cases.
"We have seen cases where relatives of patients came back as sick people
because they have been contaminated," Tiendrebeogo said.
West Africa's semi-arid Sahelian countries, sometimes referred to as the
"meningitis belt" are hit each year by outbreaks of bacterial meningitis
during the dry seasons between December and June. Dust-laden winds along
with cold nights combine to lower people's immunity to respiratory tract
infections, which makes it easier to contract meningitis.
Hartl of WHO said four countries - Burkina Faso, Sudan, the Democratic
Republic of Congo and Uganda - are currently experiencing the worst
epidemics among African countries that have been hit this year. Other
affected countries include Côte d'Ivoire, Niger, Mali, Benin, Ghana,
Togo and Guinea.
Typically, five to 10 percent of meningitis patients die within 24 to 48
hours of the first symptoms, while 10 to 20 percent of survivors suffer
brain damage, hearing loss, and learning disabilities.
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