The World Health Organisation and four other international health organisation has warned that Africa is at risk of a large meningitis outbreak because an acute shortage of meningitis C-containing vaccine threatens to severely limit the world’s ability to minimize the number of people affected.
International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), Médecins sans Frontières (MSF), The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and the WHO (the 4 organizations, which together constitute the International Coordinating Group for Vaccine Provision for Epidemic Meningitis Control – ICG) called on vaccine manufacturers to step up meningitis C-containing vaccine production by 5 million doses before the 2016 meningitis season starts in January.
Dr William Perea, Coordinator for Control of Epidemic Diseases Unit at WHO said “Meningitis tends to hit Africa in cycles. Cases of meningitis C have been rising since 2013, first in Nigeria in 2013 and 2014, and then in Niger in 2015. We have to be ready for a much larger number of cases during the 2016 meningitis season.”
Dr Imran Mirza, Helath Specialist, Program Division, UNICEF added that “We have had preliminary discussions with vaccine manufacturers and impressed upon them the need to produce a stockpile of 5 million doses of vaccine so as to be ready for flare-ups of the disease next year in Africa, but so far they haven’t yet revised their production plans to meet demand.”
Dr Myriam Henkens, International Medical Coordinator, MSF noted that “In just the first 6 months of 2015, there have been 12,000 cases of meningitis C in Niger and Nigeria, and 800 deaths. At the same time, there has been a critical shortage of vaccine.
“The campaigns consequently were limited to the critically affected age groups and areas, and even so, had to be delayed until vaccine supply became available and we believe next year will be worse. We need vaccine manufacturers to plan production of multivalent vaccine now to allow sufficient lead time and capacity to meet this demand.”