Attachments
OVERVIEW
This Weekly Bulletin focuses on public health emergencies occurring in the WHO African region. This week’s articles cover:
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Humanitarian crisis in South Sudan
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Circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 in Kenya
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Circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 in the United Republic of Tanzania
For each of these events, a brief description, followed by public health measures implemented and an interpretation of the situation is provided.
A table is provided at the end of the bulletin with information on all new and ongoing public health events currently being monitored in the region, as well as recent events that have been controlled and closed.
Major issues and challenges include:
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South Sudan’s ongoing humanitarian crisis is being compounded by an influx of refugees fleeing the armed conflict in neighbouring Sudan. Available resources are overstretched, and only 39% of the 2023 humanitarian response plan has been funded, creating a critical funding gap to sustain response activities. With more people expected to arrive in the weeks and months ahead, as well as the internal crises the country faces resulting from its armed violence and climate-related emergencies, the situation looks dire, necessitating urgent support from donors and partners to meet the increasing humanitarian demands in the country.
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Kenya and Tanzania have recently reported cases of circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus linked to cross-border spread, where suboptimal vaccination coverage and immunization levels coupled with mass transboundary population movements pose a high risk for the potential spread of polio infection. In all instances, the continued spread of existing outbreaks as well as the emergence of new outbreaks of cVDPV2 point to gaps in routine immunization coverage and inadequate outbreak response vaccination. It is important to respond with a high-quality reactive vaccination campaign in the current outbreak as well as maintain uniformly high routine immunization coverage at the subnational levels to minimize the consequences of any new virus introduction.