Nigeria news and features

Gavi Board agrees to extend support for inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) to 2020; new policy on fragile settings, emergencies and refugees also approved.

Measles outbreaks in numerous countries – caused by gaps in routine immunisation and in mass vaccination campaigns – continue to be a serious challenge.

With more than half of Gavi-supported countries officially listed as fragile states, Gavi is increasingly working on several fronts to ensure vaccines still reach people living on the frontlines of humanitarian crises.

Children in Sudan are set to become the first in the Meningitis belt to benefit from the introduction of Meningitis A vaccine into a routine immunization programme.

First-ever Ministerial Conference on Immunization in Africa delivers concludes with signed declaration to promote the use of vaccines across the African continent.

Joint press release first published by WHO and PATH, joint founders of the Meningitis Vaccine Project.

Organization of African First Ladies ask African countries to finish unfinished business

Gavi Board Chair steps down after five years of unparalleled achievement.

New data released by the World Health Organization (WHO) for the Measles & Rubella Initiative, estimates that 17.1 million lives have been saved since 2000, largely due to increased vaccination coverage against this highly contagious viral disease.

New research forecasts a resurgence of meningitis A epidemics in 15 years should immunization efforts stall.

Former Nigerian Minister of Finance joins Vaccine Alliance drive to reach every child with life-saving vaccines.

Polio-endemic country takes another step towards a polio-free future as it introduces IPV into its routine immunisation programme, as part of largest globally coordinated vaccine introduction in history (joint press release Pakistan MoH, UNICEF, GPEI, WHO, Gavi).

In a landmark step to help accelerate the global eradication of polio and protect its children against measles and rubella, Papua New Guinea introduces the inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) into its routine immunisation programme and launches a nationwide measles-rubella vaccine (MR) campaign.

Statement from Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.

Coverage trends heading in right direction but major differences remain between countries.

Côte d’Ivoire is introducing the inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) into its routine immunisation programme.

Democratic Republic of Congo to introduce Inactivated Polio Vaccine with Gavi and partners’ support.

More than three million children to be protected against polio and the leading cause of pneumonia (joint press release Gavi, UNICEF, WHO, GPEI).

Vaccine manufacturers and private firms set out commitments ahead of major Gavi conference

Audit of cash support in Nigeria relating to funds disbursed in the period 2011-2013.

Nepal is one of 25 countries who have received approval to begin using IPV with Gavi support. Afghanistan and Pakistan are also planning to introduce IPV by end of next year.

How the 5-in-1 pentavalent vaccine is now protecting children in all of the world's poorest countries

Introductions target successfully achieved – work still to be done on increasing coverage.

Canadian PM Harper calls on countries to invest politically, financially to improve maternal, newborn and child health

African leaders gather in Abuja, Nigeria, to endorse a declaration to invest in children's immunisation.

CEO breakfast at WEF Africa puts spotlight on role of private sector partnerships in vaccinating children in Africa.

Reviews highlight effectiveness of pneumococcal vaccine dosing schedule and importance of rotavirus surveillance.

Countries eligible for GAVI Alliance support invited to apply for funding for inactivated polio vaccine until 2015.

Mass preventive campaign will protect close to 60 million children and adults.

Alliance Board selects additional vaccines to include in its portfolio.

GAVI welcomes Canada’s US$ 20 million pledge to accelerate access to measles vaccines.

Sabin Vaccine Institute convenes government officials to discuss progress on sustainable immunization financing programs (News release: Sabin Vaccine Institute).

The GAVI Alliance has approved US$ 21 million to help improve vaccine supply chains in Nigeria as part of a partnership aimed at scaling up routine immunisation. 

Scientists, doctors, experts from 75 countries highlight achievability of polio eradication

The GAVI Alliance joins the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF and the Government of Nigeria in condemning attacks in Nigeria which have killed and injured health workers.

In its first ever Multilateral Organisation Performance Assessment Network (MOPAN) review the GAVI Alliance has been commended for its effectiveness in increasing access to immunisation and for its focus on results.

The World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF and the GAVI Alliance join the Government of Pakistan and the provinces of Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in condemning the multiple attacks that have killed six health workers in the past 24 hours.

A revolutionary meningitis vaccine will reach the 100 millionth person this week in a region of Africa that has been plagued by deadly epidemics for more than a century. The milestone will take place in northern Nigeria, part of Africa’s “meningitis belt’, where the country is conducting its second seasonal immunisation campaign against the disease.

Partners Forum 2012 - Session summary. Speakers presented about the unique contributions of faith based organizations, faith institutions and faith leaders, to achieving the promise of vaccines in health services delivery, community mobilization and advocacy.

Partners Forum 2012 - Session summary. A discussion among presenters Anne Lafond (of ARISE/JSI in the U.S.), Sharmin Zahan (of BRAC in Bangladesh), Fatima Adamu (Usmanu Danfodyo University in Nigeria) and Lubna Hashmat (Civil Society Human and Institutional Development Program in Pakistan), who uniformly made the case for strengthening the engagement of all stakeholders in countries’ EPI programs (Expanded Program on Immunization) in order to reach the most marginalized populations with immunization.

Partners Forum 2012 - Session summary. Administrative data systems are of highly variable quality across different GAVI eligible countries. Sources of error include numerator and denominator measurement inaccuracies.

Partners Forum 2012 - Session summary. In this Decade of Vaccines, the Partners Forum discussions are centred on four of its founding principles - Results, Innovation, Sustainability and Equity.

There’s a lot to celebrate this World Polio Day. In all but three countries of the world, polio has been eradicated with the support of WHO and its partners in the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. This year, fewer children (171) have been paralyzed by this crippling virus, in fewer parts of the world than ever before.

Efforts to eliminate meningitis in 26 at-risk countries will take a major step forward over the next three months as 50 million people receive crucial vaccinations in seven African countries.

High-level conference on child survival kicks-off with a goal of ending all preventable child deaths around the world in a generation.

Addressing a gathering of global leaders on child and maternal health, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton describes the child mortality gap between rich and poor countries as "shocking".

New investment tops year of progress in providing world's poorest children with equitable access to life-saving vaccines.

Nigerian vaccine introductions set to save as many as 30,000 child lives every year following this year’s launch of the pentavalent vaccine and next year’s launch of the pneumococcal vaccine.

Tailored approach required to ensure routine immunisation reaches 19.3 million children who miss out every year.

As a programme officer with the GAVI Alliance, Nilgun Aydogan is responsible not only for helping south Asian countries apply for funding to introduce life-saving vaccines but also for monitoring the effectiveness of their immunisation programmes.

Launching the “Every Child Deserves a Fifth Birthday” social media campaign in Washington,  the head of the United States Agency for International Development gives a sneak peek of his vision for a world with zero child deaths from preventable diseases.

A study released today by the International Vaccine Access Center (IVAC) at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health has identified the most feasible and impactful solutions for Nigeria’s immunisation programme that could offer the best hope yet for scaling up vaccine access to the nation’s most rural areas and taking aim at the country’s precipitous number of child deaths.

Interview with Muhammad Sani Adamu, Head of Accelerated Disease Control in Nigeria’s National Primary Health Care Development Agency, who played a key role in rolling out the new vaccine against meningitis A, MenAfriVac, to Nigeria’s northern states.

One of the first countries to introduce the new meningitis A vaccine (MenAfriVac), Chad ran an immunisation campaign with GAVI support in December 2011 to help eliminate the region’s devastating epidemics.

Statement by GAVI Alliance CEO, Seth Berkley MD on India's success in staying free of polio for a year and its renewed commitment to immunisation.
 

In this special Q and A, GAVI’s Deputy CEO Helen Evans discusses the challenges and opportunities facing the Alliance after last June’s successful replenishment process.

Feared for centuries because of the death and paralysis it causes, polio is finally on the edge of eradication.

The GAVI Alliance has committed US$ 100 million to help tackle meningitis A in Cameroon, Chad, and Nigeria, part of a strategy to save tens of thousands of lives in Africa with a new life-saving vaccine, MenAfriVac.

New vaccines against the pneumococcal bacteria and rotavirus could save more than one million children's lives each year, but a US$ 4 billion gap in funding threatens these and other immunisation programmes, a report published jointly today by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and the GAVI Alliance, said.

The World Health Organization has recommended that rotavirus vaccination be included in all national immunization programmes in order to provide protection against a virus that is responsible for more than 500,000 diarrhoeal deaths and two million hospitalisations annually among children.
 

In an effort to save lives and contain the spread of meningitis, the GAVI Alliance has fast tracked a US$ 55 million contribution to establish a stockpile of meningococcal vaccines and pay for reactive campaigns in the highly endemic African “meningitis belt” countries.

Yellow Fever epidemic contained after combined efforts from the Yellow Fever Partnership to vaccinate over 2.2 million people in the Ivorian capital.

$58 million GAVI contribution to prevent highly contagious disease in 12 West African nations.

A concerted effort and careful strategic planning, involving people at many different levels, has tackled a desperate immunisation situation in Nigeria.

AMP and partners convene first seminar-workshop in Bamako, Mali, to organise fight against yellow fever in Central and Western Africa.

Immunization at the global level has progressed very well during the past 25 years, but further increases in coverage would save the lives of millions more who do not yet benefit from this protection, said a group of immunization partners at the World Vaccine Congress in Lyon, France.