The World Health Organization (WHO) has pledged to donate around 3.5 million doses of cholera vaccine to Mozambique as case numbers climb, reports Mozambican news agency AIM.
Mozambican President Daniel Chapo announced the donation after meeting with WHO Director-General Tedros Ghebreyesus in Geneva, part of a four-day working visit to the Swiss city. Government data released Tuesday shows that Mozambique has recorded 329 cases since early September, in the provinces of Tete (186) and Nampula (143), including two deaths.
Chapo told reporters that the donated vaccines will be administered through the new National Cholera Elimination Plan, approved by the Council of Ministers last month.
Budgeted at around 31 billion metacais (US$485 million), the plan aims to carry out preventative vaccination campaigns in high-risk areas with the goal of eliminating cholera as a public health issue by 2030.
[See more: Cholera has killed over 200 people in Angola since January]
The initiative, according to Council of Ministers spokesperson Inocêncio Impissa, will be financed by the state budget, bilateral and multilateral cooperation partners, public-private partnerships and philanthropic organisations.
Speaking to reporting after the plan’s passage in mid-September, Impissa emphasised that cholera is “multifactorial and its control and elimination requires action on the main determinants. It is, therefore, the government’s vision to have a Mozambique free of cholera as a public health problem by 2030, where communities have access to safe water, sanitation and quality health care achieved through multisectoral, coordinated actions informed by scientific evidence.”
The WHO recommends such preventative measures in combination with oral cholera vaccines among those at high risk of the disease. Two doses, administered 1-6 weeks apart, are recommended, with protection lasting at least two years in adults and six months in children aged 1-5 years.
Mozambique received 2.3 million doses of cholera vaccines last May from the WHO and UNICEF, strengthening efforts by the Ministry of Health (MISAU) to protect children over one year old and their families in high-risk areas.
