The Democratic Republic of Congo is set to receive three million doses of the mpox vaccine from Japan next week, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC). Despite ongoing vaccinations in the country, there are no available shots for children, who are particularly vulnerable to the potentially deadly infection, which has spread from its epicentre in Goma, North Kivu province.
In September, Japan promised to contribute doses from its national supply of LC16m8 vaccinations, which were first created for smallpox by local company KM Biologics and are also effective against mpox.
But a legal obstacle delayed the contribution.
“The good news we got from Japan is that, next week, we are getting the Japanese vaccine in DRC that will allow the vaccination of children,” President Jean Kaseya of the CDC’s Africa division told reporters.
The World Health Organization has deemed the epidemic a worldwide public health emergency, and the receipt of the dosages will increase prospects of stopping it.
According to the most recent Africa CDC statistics, children under the age of 15 account for almost 44% of the 10,533 confirmed mpox cases in Congo.
According to Kaseya, children ages 0 to 5 will receive the Japanese vaccination. A bifurcated needle is used to inject it, puncturing the skin fifteen times to give the vaccination.
Dieudonne Mwamba, the head of Congo’s National Institute for Public Health, stated at the same conference that a Japanese delegation will visit the country this weekend to teach medical personnel who are unfamiliar with this approach.
According to Kaseya, the Africa CDC has already contacted Japan to inquire about the availability of more dosages for other nations on the continent.
“We are negotiating with them, and we’ll see what the outcome will be, but they were open to that,” he stated during the briefing.
