Remarks by WHO Regional Director for Africa, Dr Matshidiso Moeti
Greetings to everyone joining this press conference today in the lead up to the African Vaccination Week, which starts this Saturday. This is a chance to celebrate the lives saved and illnesses averted through vaccination, which is one of the highest-impact and most cost-effective public health tools.
I’m very happy to be joined for this conversation by Dr Edwin Dikoloti, Honourable Minister of Health and Wellness of Botswana, who can tell us about how routine immunization has improved the health and survival of children in that country. A warm welcome, Honourable Minister. I’m also pleased to be joined by Dr Austin Demby, the Honourable Minister of Health of Sierra Leone, where the Johnson and Johnson Ebola vaccine is about to be rolled out. A warm welcome to you, Minister as well.
There have now been more than 4.4 million COVID-19 cases on the African continent and sadly 118,000 people have died. We are still seeing all together a plateau at around 75,000 new cases a week, with an upward trend though in 12 countries in recent weeks.
So, this year you’ve heard me advocate for the speedy and equitable rollout of COVID-19 vaccines on the continent. The African Vaccination Week is a key moment also to push for crucial immunization campaigns against diseases like measles, polio and yellow fever.
For instance, 15 African countries delayed measles immunization campaigns last year as they dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic. While seven of these countries have now completed the campaigns, eight remain outstanding, posing a risk of outbreaks.
Preliminary data shows that an estimated 16.6 million children in Africa missed planned supplemental measles vaccine doses between January 2020 and April 2021. As we fight COVID-19, we can’t leave anyone dangerously exposed to other preventable diseases.
We have high hopes that vaccines will help bring the COVID-19 pandemic to an end.
Last year we celebrated the historic milestone of Africa kicking wild poliovirus out of the continent – vaccines were pivotal to this.
Routine immunization has played a vital role in improving child survival, contributing to halving the death rate of children below 5 years of age in sub-Saharan Africa in the past 20 years.
So far, 19 African countries have achieved the benchmark of at least 90% coverage of diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis, or DTP3, vaccine. This is the key indicator used to assess the performance of routine immunization programmes. However, at the regional level for the past 10 years, the DTP3 coverage has stalled at between 70 and 75 per cent.
Every year an estimated nine million children in the Region in rural and urban areas, miss out on routine vaccines. Sixty per cent of these children are living in Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ethiopia.
To reach every child with vaccination, countries need to address challenges of inadequate infrastructure, transport and power supply, limited frontline health-care workers, and stockouts of vaccines and other essentials, like syringes. Children in poorer families, and those living in areas of conflict or prolonged humanitarian crises, also miss out.
African Heads of State have shown their commitment to enhancing universal access to vaccines through the Addis Declaration on Immunization in 2017.
To maintain this momentum, increased domestic investment is needed, with support from partners, to strengthen immunization programmes as part of primary health care systems in countries. This should be backed by sufficient numbers of trained health workers and functional surveillance and health information systems, with engaged communities and caregivers, and attention to children living in the most difficult circumstances.
The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically highlighted the enormous value of vaccines. In the United States for example, among 75 million people fully vaccinated against the virus, fewer than 6000 COVID-19 cases have been reported.
Vaccines are bringing us closer to ending this pandemic, and the faster they can be rolled out in African countries, the sooner our economies and societies can recover and build back better. This includes investing in capacities in Africa to manufacture medical products, like vaccines, to enhance our self-reliance.
Although there are delays in shipments through the COVAX Facility, seven African countries received their first deliveries last week. This brings the total to 41 countries in Africa that have received over 18 million doses through the COVAX platform.
However, I am concerned that seven countries have now used up all of their COVAX doses and will need to receive follow-up doses from early May to mid-June.
WHO and COVAX partners continue to engage in intensive negotiations to ensure African countries will get their second doses of the vaccine in a timely manner.
We also encourage countries that have not been able to use their doses and high-income countries that have vaccinated their most at-risk groups, to share their supplies with the few remaining countries that have not yet received a shipment.
On a different note, we will commemorate World Malaria Day, this Sunday. The WHO African Region accounts for 94% of global malaria cases and deaths, despite significant progress made in the past 20 years.
In 2019 there were still more than 215 million malaria cases and 384,000 deaths in the Region. Malaria wreaks havoc on our societies and economies, and it can be prevented by controlling mosquito populations and using insecticide-treated bed nets. Ensuring early access to testing and treatment is also crucial.
To accelerate progress towards zero malaria, governments should invest in outreach services and training of community health workers to provide care for malaria, pneumonia and other common illnesses. Innovations will also be critical. So, we are excited that Ghana, Kenya and Malawi have delivered more than 1.7 million doses of the RTS’S vaccine. This is a promising additional tool in malaria prevention.
COVID-19 has shown that we each have a role to play in combatting infectious diseases and I ask that we use this learning in the fight against malaria and vaccine-preventable diseases.
Finally, in closing, I’d like to congratulate the Gambia for receiving WHO certification of the elimination of trachoma as a public health problem. This shows the impressive work underway to address other priorities even as we respond to COVID-19.
So, I’d like to thank you again, Honourable Ministers and my fellow panelists and our journalist colleagues for joining us and I look forward to our conversation.