By Staff writer.
Kampala, Uganda –The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and World Health Organization together with South Sudan’s Ministry of Health have said they will be conducting an immunization campaign against measles from 3rd to 11th of this month.
The two humanitarian organizations have said they are targeting to vaccinate children in the age group of 6-59 months.
More than 2.3 million children will be immunized against measles in South Sudan.
Even those that were already vaccinated or had suffered measles before will also be immunized. The children will also receive deworming tablets and vitamin A supplementation.
According to the World Health Organization, the measles cases in South Sudan have increased over the past 10 years despite the existence of campaigns against it.
The campaign targets 2,324,565 people by 14720 vaccinators of 3680 teams of 1230 team supervisors.
Measles outbreak started in December 2014, and affected 11 localities of Kassala and Gedaref States by January 2015. In April, the outbreak was reported in additional 28 localities in Kassala, Sennar, the Red Sea, West, East, and North Darfur states. Sudan Red Crescent Society (SRCS) in collaboration with MoH, UNICEF and WHO are conducting vaccination campaigns across the targeted States as appropriate .
In October 2016 over 21,000 people were vaccinated against measles in Abyei, following an outbreak declared by the Ministry of Health in September.
Since the beginning of 2016, a total of 2,294 suspected measles cases including at least 28 deaths (CFR 1.22%) have been reported countrywide.
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