|
|||
|---|---|---|---|
|
22/12/2000 A major epidemic of yellow fever is weeping the west African state of Guinea. According to the medical charity, MSF, the lives of several million people are threated. Preventative treatment is by vaccination, but at the moment MSF teams, who are carrying out the vaccinations in collaboration with the Guinean Ministry of Health, are short of 1.5 million doses. Yellow Fever is a highly contagious killer disease, transmitted by mosquitoes. Mortality figures can run as high as 80 per cent. More than two and a half million people, including the entire population of Guinea's capital Conakry, are at risk. Already nearly 500 cases have been reported. At present vaccination rates it will take more than six months to immunize all these people against the disease. However this assumes that supplies of vaccine will be available. Yellow fever vaccine is produced on demand. Stocks are limited. MSF believe that even if every drop of yellow fever vaccine is flown to Guinea, they will still be short of one and a half million doses. This vaccine deficit may have grave consequences, especially during the next rainy season in May, when conditions for yellow-fever carrying mosquitoes become more favourable to spread the disease. All people at risk must be vaccinated by that time say MSF. The charity is calling on the international community, in particular the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), to begin to developing yellow fever vaccine stocks immediately so as to allow a more rapid response to future outbreaks. The European Commission is addressing these concerns with aid worth EUR 1.7 million to MSF and other humanitarian organisations in Guinea and Liberia, it has just been announced.
©EuropaWorld 2000 - Copyright Policy
|
|||
