Day: April 10, 2022

After two years of racing to vaccinate the world against Covid-19, the number of available doses now surpasses demand in many areas.

Yet a gap remains in vaccination rates between the richest and poorest countries.

On Friday, Gavi, which co-leads the Covax global distribution scheme, is holding a summit calling for more funds to address the issue of inequality in vaccine access.

More than 13 billion doses have been produced since the pandemic, 11 billion of which have been administered, according to the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations (IFPMA).

Science research group Airfinity expect nine billion more doses to be produced this year. Pfizer alone plans to make four billion doses.

Yet demand could fall to six billion doses this year, IFPMA’s director general Thomas Cueni said.

“Since mid-2021, global vaccine production has exceeded global vaccine demand and this gap has continuously risen,” Cueni said.

By next year, production could exceed demand by 1.3 to 3.1 billion doses, he added.

Many richer nations are now approaching oversupply. European Union and G7 countries had a surplus of 497 million doses at the end of last month.

There are fears that doses could go to waste. Covid vaccines have a relatively short shelf-life — AstraZeneca and Novavax’s jabs have a six-month expiry date.

Airfinity says 241 million doses have passed their sell-by date so far during the pandemic.

Nevertheless, billions of people remain unvaccinated around the world, most of them in developing nations.

Covax, an international public-private partnership co-led by WHO and Gavi, has delivered 1.4 billion doses to 145 countries — far short of the planned two billion doses by end-2021.

World Health Organisation chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has warned that inequality in vaccine access could lead to the emergence of new, possibly more contagious variants.

The WHO wants 70 percent of every country’s population vaccinated by July.

But records are uneven.

Nearly 80 percent of France’s population, for example, has received two doses. But only 15 percent of the population on the continent of Africa is fully vaccinated, according to Oxford University data.

An average of 42 percent of the population of 92 low- and middle-income countries participating in Covax have had two doses.

“Vaccine inequity is the biggest moral failure of our times and people and countries are paying the price,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said earlier this year.

Covax says it now has enough doses to vaccinate around 45 percent of the population in the 92 countries receiving donations. But 25 of those countries lack the infrastructure for an effective immunisation campaign.

Making matters worse, many developing countries are being donated doses too close to their expiry date.

UNICEF’s supply division director Etleva Kadilli said that in December almost more than 100 million doses had been refused, “the majority due to product shelf life”.

Gavi has ruled that doses must be valid for at least 10 weeks on arriving in countries.

Countries like South Africa and India have long called for the World Trade Organisation to suspend intellectual property rights for vaccines and anti-Covid treatments, so they can massively boost production.

After fierce opposition from pharmaceutical giants, a first compromise was reached between the United States, European Union, India and South Africa last month.

But several key countries like Switzerland have yet to sign on. Doctors Without Borders also says there are “key limitations” in the deal, such as covering only vaccines and geographical limits.

Pharmaceutical companies argue that patents are not the real problem.

Cueni of IFPMA, a big pharma lobby group, said the problem was now logistics.

“What we need is money to have storage, transportation, more trained health workers, campaigns to counter misinformation: these are the real challenges and not the patent waiver,” he said.

Current vaccines target the virus that swept the world in 2020. While they greatly reduce the risk of serious illness from Covid, they only provide partial protection — particularly against newer variants such as the now dominant Omicron.

Several vaccine manufacturers have begun testing jabs that target Omicron. They have hit delays but could be available in a few months, if approved by health authorities.

And despite the billions yet to receive a first dose, the United States, Britain, France and Israel have started rolling out a fourth, starting with the most vulnerable.

On Wednesday, the EU’s medicines watchdog approved a second booster for people aged 80 years and over.

“No country can boost its way out of the pandemic,” Tedros has warned.

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

NAIROBI, It has been a week of crises in East Africa, characterized by shortages of fuel and rising prices of consumer goods, as the region continued to shake off COVID-19 blues to revive state economies.I

Many areas have recently experienced biting fuel shortages and, where the commodity is available, the price has risen to prohibitive levels.

The cost of living is rising. Inflation is at 6.29 percent in Kenya, 3.2 percent in Uganda, 4.2 percent in Rwanda, 3.8 percent in Tanzania, 13.3 percent in Burundi, 25 percent in South Sudan, and five percent in DR Congo.

In Uganda, where fuel supply has been disrupted since January, there are places where a liter of petrol costs $3.

Kenya was hit by a shortage this past week, crippling public transport services. Traders claimed the shortage had led to an increase in prices of fast-moving goods.

In Kenya, the fuel shortage was blamed on the failure of the government to pay oil marketers their subsidy. Even after President Uhuru Kenyatta signed a supplementary budget for the payment of Ksh34 billion ($298 million) to the Petroleum Development Levy Fund (PDLF), the shortage continued on account of a dispute over the amount that the government owes the oil companies. Officials said it was Ksh13 billion ($112 million), but the companies claim they are owed more than Ksh20 billion ($173 million).

Source: Nam News Network

Since the deployment of the multi-partner country support teams in January 2022, there has been good progress in vaccine absorption and uptake in the African Region.

Among countries that reported an increase in vaccine uptake in February and/or March, Mozambique, Ethiopia,

Uganda, Kenya and Ghana recorded the highest increase in vaccination coverage. In February and March 2022, Ethiopia implemented the second round of a mass vaccination campaign, which further boosted COVID-19 vaccine coverage in the country, with increased numbers of people receiving their second dose, more people starting with their first dose, and increased uptake of booster doses.

Two countries, Seychelles and Mauritius, surpassed the target of 70% of the population fully vaccinated by the end of December 2021. Four countries – Rwanda, Botswana, Cabo Verde and Mozambique – are on track to reach this target, having vaccinated between 40% and 70% of their populations by the end of December 2021.

However, challenges remain. In the African Region, 12.8% of the population were fully vaccinated as of 27 March 2022 (10.2% at the end of February 2022), compared to 57.5% globally. Thirteen countries are yet to surpass 10% of their population fully vaccinated including two of the most populous countries in the Region (Nigeria and Democratic Republic of the Congo).

The COVAX Facility continues to be the leading source of vaccines delivered in the African Region, accounting for 68% of doses received.

The absorption rate of the vaccines received remains suboptimal overall, with only 54.9% of doses administered of the quantity received. Twentyfour countries out of 46 (52%) have administered fewer than 50% of doses received. Vaccine doses administered increased by 23% in February 2022 compared to January 2022, but in March 2022 the number of vaccine doses administered decreased by 35%.

On average, 8 271 347 doses were administered per week in March 2022 compared to 12 734 357 doses per week in February 2022.

The Region needs a twelvefold increase in the weekly number of doses to be administered from April 2022 to June 2022 to continue to move towards 70% target .

Thirty-one countries out of 46 have reported expired doses. The percentage of expired doses of all doses received was 1.7% among the 31 countries and 0.9% in the African Region overall.

As a result of mass vaccination campaigns, nine countries out of the 20 priority countries in the WHO African Region recorded an increase in doses administered in February 2022 (Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, GuineaBissau, Madagascar, South Sudan, Ghana, Uganda and United Republic of Tanzania). However, only three have continued to record increased vaccine uptake in March 2022 (Ghana, Cameroon and South Sudan) in addition to Mozambique, Mali and Burundi. This shows that it is necessary to keep up the momentum in vaccine uptake between mass vaccination campaigns. It is critical for countries to intensify activities aimed at promoting continued use of health facility vaccination sites, as well as implement the provider-initiated vaccination approach in health facilities. In January 2022, WHO, UNICEF and Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance launched the COVID-19 Vaccine Delivery Partnership (CoVDP) as an inter-agency initiative. This will build on existing resources globally, regionally and incountry in order to accelerate vaccination coverage in those countries most in need of support. CoVDP complies with the principles of one country team, one plan, one budget and one support team. In March 2022, in-depth country calls were held with Nigeria, Ethiopia, Kenya, Democratic Republic of Congo, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone to discuss issues around urgent funding requests, and identify sources of funding, enhance operational planning and improve vaccination service delivery. The first quarter of 2022 has shown improvements in vaccine uptake and coverage across the Region, which is benefiting from the deployment of the WHO AFRO multi-partner country support teams, which started in January 2022. Although challenges remain, this initiative, along with CoVDP, promises to continue to improve vaccine absorption and uptake and move more countries in the Region closer to the 70% target.

Source: World Health Organization

A leading member of the Forces for Freedom and Change (FFC) Yasir Arman warned against attempts by the banned Islamist National Congress Party (NCP) to take control of the state and army, taking advantage of the country’s current political strife in the country.

In an article extended to the Sudan Tribune on Saturday, Arman said that the NCP is seeking to regain control of state institutions and the Sudanese army as the means to return to rule the country.

“The National Congress Party and its Islamist leaders could not rule Sudan, or even defeat Dr Hassan al-Turabi (in 1999) without controlling state institutions and the armed forces,” he wrote.

He stressed that the NCP seeks to exploit the isolation experienced by the coup leaders to control the army again.

After the coup, Al-Burhan appointed a number of Islamist cadres in the country’s sensitive organs, including the presidency, the intelligence and security services, the foreign ministry and the judiciary. Also and the Islamists who were dismissed from the civil service and public institutions have been reinstated while the businessmen recovered their companies and assets.

The judiciary, also, released NCP leader Ibrahim Ghandour and a number of Islamist leaders on Wednesday, April 6. Ghandour appeared alongside some leaders wanted by the prosecution, while rumours are circulating in Khartoum about the imminent release of other detained leaders, including former President Omer al-Bashir.

In an interview with Al Jazeera TV on Thursday, Ghandour praised al-Burhan’s coup, describing it as a corrective step to mistakes made by the Sudanese army, particularly the signing of a political agreement with the FFC as a representative for the revolution’s forces.

Arman said that Ghandour, despite his goodwill gestures, seemed cautiously angry with the armed forces, because they signed the Constitutional Declaration with the FFC and accepted to put the NCP leaders in jail.

Return of war

Arman warned the armed movements signatory of the Juba Peace Agreement that the NCP’s return to power would have a negative impact on the peace implementation process, such as what happened to the democratic transition process.

The SPLM-N deputy leader underscored that Ghandour described them as “rebels” before saying that the return of the al-Bashir party would lead to the eruption of war again in Sudan.

“The return of the National Congress Party necessarily means the return of wars later, repression and looting of resources.”

He added armed struggle movements should know that they are the first concerned with this issue and that it is just a matter of time.

Arman concluded his paper by appealing to the revolution’s forces to make concessions to each other rather than to their opponents, as he said, and to agree on a unified and comprehensive platform for the transitional period.

Source: Sudan Tribune

Food insecurity is likely to rise by seven percent across South Sudan in the coming months, compared to last year, a United Nations report on food security noted amidst calls for more humanitarian and livelihoods assistance to avert looming hunger and enhance resilience.

According to the latest Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) analysis, climatic shocks, conflict, economic downturn, displacement and disrupted livelihoods are driving the worsening trend in food security with 7.74 million people across the country slated to face crisis or worse levels of acute food insecurity during the lean season between April and July 2022.

It says more than 80 percent of the entire food-insecure population are from Jonglei, Unity, Upper Nile, Lakes, Eastern Equatoria and Warrap states.

The UN said greater humanitarian assistance and livelihoods support is urgently needed immediately to save lives and prevent the collapse of livelihoods in the worst-affected locations across the young nation.

“FAO is concerned by the rising number of food-insecure people driven by the additional burden of heavy flooding that has occurred in the country for the last three consecutive years,” said Meshack Malo, the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) Representative in South Sudan.

He added, “To tackle acute hunger, we need to produce more food where it is needed most. FAO will continue to provide seeds, tools and fishing kits to people in urgent need of assistance. We also need increased investment to allow us to find innovative ways to help South Sudanese farmers adapt to climate change so they can grow enough food to meet their nutritional requirements”.

In response to flooding, FAO has reportedly been assisting vulnerable farmers to build dykes and water channels, providing trainings on eco-friendly best agricultural practices and post-harvest handling, and is also promoting increased use of flood-resistant food crops such as rice.

The IPC report further shows that about 1.34 million children under five years in Jonglei, Upper Nile, Unity and Western Bahr el Ghazal states are likely to suffer from acute malnutrition due to inadequate feeding practices.

“As access to those in need improves due to the peace process, we have been making significant progress in treating severe malnutrition in children, but floods and other climate-related shocks leave more children vulnerable. More than 90 percent of children under five put into therapeutic feeding programmes fully recover, and yet funding for this life-saving response is increasingly a challenge,” said Jesper Moller, the acting UN Children Fund (UNICEF) Representative in South Sudan.

The report says three consecutive years of increased flooding, loss of livelihoods, destruction of farmland and livestock and subsequent displacement have deepened the dire hunger crisis engulfing South Sudan, pushing millions into abject poverty as food becomes scarce and millions struggle to survive.

Without consistent humanitarian and agricultural assistance to help communities cope and tackle hunger by supporting those who grow their own food – severe humanitarian consequences are inevitable, it stressed.

“We are extremely concerned with the findings that point to a continued deterioration in the food security situation and a sharp rise in the number of people facing hunger,” said Adeyinka Badejo, the acting country director for World Food Programme (WF) South Sudan.

He added, “The 2022 IPC report represents a successful and collaborative multi-stakeholder process led by the Government of South Sudan. Its findings compel us all to take urgent steps to alleviate severe hunger and prevent a further deterioration in the coming months, while simultaneously building resilience to future shocks,” added Badejo.

Meanwhile, FAO, UNICEF and WFP are calling for greater funding to allow for increased humanitarian assistance and continued implementation of the peace deal to address the root causes of insecurity across the country.

Source: Sudan Tribune