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Liberia

Liberia: Measles Outbreak - Emergency Plan of Action Operation Update n° 1, DREF n° MDRLR006

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This update is to inform stakeholders of Liberia Measles DREF response progress from 7 May to August 2022 and extend the time frame for 02 additional months. The new end date is 31 October 2022 for a total duration of 05 months.

The budget and strategy remain the same as the DREF Plan of Action. Most of the activities (around 60%) planned have been completed and the extension is to allow the completion of the following ones:

  • Support the Government with social mobilization during a planned nationwide immunization campaign for measles which was delayed due to logistical challenges.

  • The NS finalizes the process of developing and concluding contracts with national and local media institutions to support community-level information sharing through radio talk shows, and phone-in radio discussions. This will help the NS obtain feedback and provide lifesaving messages.

  • IFRC monitoring visit involving the PMER and Operations Officers to monitor the quality of implementation, and support Post distribution monitoring and lessons learnt workshop

  • Support Lessons learned workshop (LLW) to generate learning from the operations, facilitated by IFRC PMER Officer

The extension is required because of the delay in implementation due to challenges in the response by the government and the NS needed to align its measles campaign and outreach activities with the government strategy and scheduled county-wide campaign (which did not start until early July). Also. our social mobilization effort is to support the government during immunization. Moreover, the LNRCS was and is still the only partner with the MoH doing social mobilization and community-level outreach and awareness for the measles vaccination campaign and the routine uptake. There is a planned nationwide campaign in September with the government relying on the strength of the Red Cross for success as the only organization currently supporting awareness raising and social

A. SITUATION ANALYSIS

Description of the disaster

On Thursday 21 April 2022, Liberia Health Ministry declared a measles outbreak affecting 14 of the 15 counties in the country. According to the Liberian Government, the outbreak is a result of low immunization rates, due to disruption of immunization activities for COVID-19 and people’s misconception on immunization. The latter, especially linked with the fear of parents to have their children inoculated with COVID-19 vaccine, rather than the measles one.

According to the Liberian Ministry of Health (MoH), the case threshold for measles outbreak corresponds to three to five cases reported in a single location in seven days. Per the National Public Health Institute’s weekly update on Liberia Public Health Surveillance & Response System, covering the period 4 -10 April 2022 (Report week 14) Montserrado County only accounted for 135 cases and 03 deaths. Moreover, two County Health Teams, Nimba and Grand Bassa reported on 22 April respectively 230 and 91 cases. Total cumulative cases from these counties accounted for 456 cases including, 189 probable and 236 suspected. On 2 May 2022, the Ministry of Health called on the attention of the national government to mobilize resources to strengthen the health system in responding to the outbreak.

As of 20 July 2022, 5 923 suspected cases, including 5 528 confirmed and 71 deaths (CFR: 1%) were reported from 61 health districts in 15 counties. Of the confirmed cases, 6.7% (369 cases) were laboratory confirmed, 9.1% (503 cases) were clinically confirmed, and 84.0% (4 657 cases) by epidemiological link. The median age of the affected population is 6 years (range: 1 month-67 years).

Measles is endemic in Liberia. However, the rapid increase in number of cases and geographical scope of the outbreak highlights a spike in cases, with a need to increase and enhance the vaccination of children under five years of age.

Per the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United States Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there is a 79% increase in measles cases across the world. As such, although the situation of Liberia is not unique, if resources are not mobilized, the already fragile health system will not be able to respond to the consequences of an outbreak.