West Darfur, Kordofan vaccination campaigns start

The Ministry of Health in West Darfur announced a medical campaign against bacterial meningitis that aims to vaccinate more than 45,000 children in less than a year.

On Monday the Ministry stated that as West Darfur borders West African nations, it is more vulnerable to epidemics.

In 2014, the Ebola virus – a viral haemorrhagic fever – broke out in West Africa. Within two years, more than 11,000 people were reported to have died from the disease, most in Liberia, Guinea, and Sierra Leone, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

According to the Sudanese Health Ministry, the country was reportedly Ebola-free, some months after the outbreak in 2014. Prevention measures were taken in several states of Sudan.

Meningitis vaccination of children up to one year has started in West Kordofan. The director of the local immunisation administration, Nasser Jubara El Khidir, told Radio Dabanga that children older than one year are planned to be vaccinated starting September.

El Khidir appealed to all residents of the state to visit the vaccination centres with their children to immunise them against meningitis.

Meningitis is a serious illness that affects the membranes surrounding the brain and spinal cord. The endemic disease occurs worldwide, with outbreaks most frequently occurring in the ‘meningitis belt’ of sub-Saharan Africa, the World Health Organisation WHO states on its website.