Nigeria is making a lot of money from the sale of malaria drugs. I think Nigeria would not like to join other African countries in receiving the malaria vaccine.
If Nigeria joins other African countries, they may probably prefer Malaria vaccines that may expire every three months.
Between 2023 and 2025, 12 nations in various parts of Africa will each receive 18 million doses of the first-ever RTS,S/AS01 malaria vaccine.
This information was sent to our correspondent on Wednesday in a joint news release from Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, the World Health Organisation, and the United Nations Children’s Fund.
The first vaccination that the World Health Organisation advises using to protect children from malaria in regions with moderate to high malaria transmission is RTS,S/AS01.
“Since 2019, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria, Unitaid, and WHO have worked together to coordinate the Malaria Vaccine Implementation Programme, which distributes the malaria vaccine to Ghana, Kenya, and Malawi.
“Since 2019, more than 1.7 million children in Ghana, Kenya, and Malawi have received the RTS,S/AS01 vaccine, which has been proven to be both safe and effective. As a result, severe malaria cases and child fatalities have significantly decreased. The malaria vaccine has attracted interest from at least 28 African nations.
The initial 18 million dose allocation will allow nine additional nations, including Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Liberia, Niger, Sierra Leone, and Uganda, to introduce the vaccine into their routine immunisation programmes for the first time, according to the statement. These nations include Ghana, Kenya, and Malawi in addition to these three.
The first doses of the vaccine should arrive in countries in the final quarter of 2023, and they should begin to be distributed by early 2024.
It stated that this allocation round makes use of the supply of vaccine doses available to Gavi through UNICEF.
The statement explained that the allocations were made using the framework for allocating the limited supply of malaria vaccine, which prioritises those doses to areas with the greatest need, where the risk of malaria illness and death among children is highest.
The managing director of country programmes delivery at Gavi, Thabani Maphosa, stated that the vaccine “has the potential to be very powerful in the fight against malaria and, when broadly deployed with other treatments, it can avoid tens of thousands of future lives per year.”
While working with manufacturers to increase supply, Maphosa said, “we need to make sure that the dosages that we do have are used as effectively as possible. To achieve this, we must apply all the lessons from our pilot projects as we widen out to a new total of 12 countries.”
Malaria continues to be one of the deadliest diseases in Africa, claiming the lives of about 500,000 children under the age of five every year. In 2021, malaria will be responsible for 96% of all cases and fatalities worldwide.
According to UNICEF Associate Director of Immunisation Ephrem Lemango, a kid under the age of five dies from malaria almost every minute. “These deaths have long been preventable and treated, but the introduction of this vaccination will increase the chances of survival for children, particularly those in Africa. We hope that as supply grows, many more kids will gain from this life-saving development.
The malaria vaccine, according to Dr. Kate O’Brien, WHO Director of Immunisation, Vaccines and Biologicals, is a breakthrough for families, communities, and children’s health and survival.
“The first allotment of malaria vaccine doses is given to children who are most at risk of dying from malaria.” The enormous demand for the vaccine and the widespread availability of children vaccination will improve fairness in malaria control and save many young lives. “We will work tirelessly to increase supply until all at-risk children have access,” O’Brien added.
