Rwanda has become the first African country to roll out vaccines against the Mpox virus as the continent works to control an outbreak.
African Union’s Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) Director-General Jean Kaseya told a virtual session Rwanda had vaccinated about 500 people, with the initial batch of 300 doses administered on Tuesday near the Rwandan border with the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)
DRC is the most affected, with nearly 22,000 cases and over 700 deaths linked to the virus between January and August.
Other countries that have reported cases include Kenya, Uganda, Burundi, and most recently, Morocco.
Africa CDC announced that Rwanda had begun vaccinating high-risk groups, including truck drivers.
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“They [Rwanda] got 1000 doses and they need more than what they requested—10,000,” he said Thursday.
Rwanda, one of the first countries to report the circulation of the novel clade 1b virus, is focusing on seven districts bordering the DRC, the epicenter of the virus.
Kaseya said the CDC is working with countries to update the vaccination plan.
“We are talking about 10 miliion doses and we are committed to making sure that Africa get at least this 10 miliion doses to protect our people,” he said.
On August 3, Africa CDC officially declared the ongoing Mpox outbreak a Public Health Emergency of Continental Security (PHECS), the agency's first such declaration since its founding in 2017.
Under Article 3, Paragraph F of the Africa CDC Statutes, this declaration empowers the organization to lead and coordinate responses to significant health emergencies.
