UN rushes vaccines to Sudan to fight yellow fever

Nov 25, 2005 (GENEVA) — The UN’s health agency said that it was rushing vaccines to Sudan to try to smother an outbreak of yellow fever there.

Sudan lacks enough vaccine stocks of its own to fight the disease, which has so far affected 491 people — and killed 126 of them — in the central region of South Kordofan, said World Health Organisation spokeswoman Fadela Chaib.

“We have learned that there are only 100,000 doses of vaccine in the country, but we are talking about a vaccination campaign for 1.7 million people,” Chaib told journalists.

“Vaccination is the only way to stop this,” she added.

The WHO and other international relief groups expect to airlift the necessary vaccines to Sudan on Saturday. It would take about two weeks to immunise people in the risk area, Chaib added.

The agency believes that the number of people infected could be higher than currently feared, she said.

“It’s possible that not all cases have been reported because of the weakness of the surveillance system in this region,” Chaib said.

Yellow fever is spread through the bite of the Aedes mosquito and health organisations have been spraying insecticide and removing stagnant water where the mosquitoes breed in a bid to contain the outbreak.

UN agencies in Sudan have launched an emergency appeal for some six million dollars in funding.