WHO has received reports of a total of
5636 cases including 392 deaths in ten out of the eleven regions in the
country (see previous report). Although overall the epidemic is now
declining, new zones and districts are still being affected. Médecins
sans Frontières, Belgium, France, Holland and Switzerland and the Ethiopian
Red Cross Society are assisting the Ethiopian Ministry of Health in implementing
the vaccination campaigns. Campaigns has been concluded in those
regions which had originally exceeded the epidemic threshold and the focus
is now on newly affected areas, particularly 3 districts: Dembia in Amhara
region; Degem and Abote in Oromiya region.
The International Coordinating Group
on Vaccine Provision for Epidemic Meningitis Control (ICG) has released
a further 370 000 doses of vaccine to the International Federation of Red
Cross and Red Crescent Societies to assist in the implementation of the
vaccination campaigns in the newly-affected areas.
In response to WHO's request to its partners in the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network, a senior communicable disease epidemiologist in the Institut National de Veille Sanitaire, Paris, France provided support to the Ethiopian Ministry of Health in data analysis, strategy development and coordination of the response. A second epidemiologist from Swiss Disaster Relief, another partner in the Network, is continuing to assist the Epidemiological Department of the Ethiopian Ministry of Health and supporting the response in the Oromiya region.
Funds have been provided by the governments of Ireland and Japan for the international response.
=A9 WHO/OMS, 1998