Health authorities from Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have agreed to roll out Ebola vaccination to start this week targeting population potentially at risk, an senior official from the ministry of Health in Kigali revealed late Thursday.
This will be the first ever vaccination campaign against the Ebola Virus Disease (EBV) for adults, adolescents, and children aged two years living within the vicinity of a possible Ebola outbreak, the ministry said.
The move comes after the World Health Organisation has prequalified last month the Ebola vaccine, Ervebo, paving the way for its use in high-risk countries such as DR Congo and its neighbors.
Prequalification, widely known as “pre-qual” means that the vaccine meets WHO standards for quality, safety and efficacy. UN agencies and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance committed to increasing access to immunisation in poor countries can now procure the vaccine for regions at risk of Ebola outbreaks.
The injectable vaccine has been shown to be effective in protecting people from the Ebola Zaire virus and is recommended by the WHO Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE), says the UN agency.
Commenting on the new move, the Rwandan Minister of State in the Ministry of health Dr Ndimubanzi Patrick welcomes the development saying that although there is no Ebola in #Rwanda, the Ministry of health has decided to strengthen preventive measures against Ebola by availing the vaccine accessible to our population.
“This vaccine is a new tool that complements the prevention measures against Ebola virus. it complements and does not replace all universal precautions for prevention, surveillance, diagnosis and early treatment,” the senior Rwandan government official said.
Speaking in the same vein, the Minister of health of Sud Kivu Province in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Cosmos Kusimwa Bishisha hailed the sign of commitment of [our] respective Heads of States to safeguard health of our populations.
“The vaccine that will complement the existing interventions has the potential of reducing new infections,” Dr Bishisha said.
In the meanwhile, a research conducted by Wellcome Trust in 2015 showed that Ervebo proved to be highly effective in combating the deadly Zaire Ebola virus.
It also suggested that a single injection would be sufficient to protect a person from contracting Ebola, unlike Johnson & Johnson’s that requires two shots eight weeks apart.
CU/abj/APA