Cameroon launched the world's first systematic and large-scale vaccination campaign against malaria on Monday, according to AFP journalists, a “historic step” according to the WHO in the fight against this deadliest disease in African children.
Noah Ngah, a six-month-old toddler, received his first injection of the RTS,S vaccine under the encouragement and songs of nurses at a small hospital in the town of Soa, 20 km from the capital Yaoundé, one of the numerous vaccination centers in “42 priority districts” of this huge Central African country with around 28 million inhabitants.
Malaria, also known as malaria, is a disease that is transmitted to humans through the bites of certain species of mosquitoes. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), more than 600,000 people die from it every year, 95% of them in Africa. And on the continent, children under five account for more than 80% of deaths.
More than 300,000 doses of British pharmaceutical company GSK's RTS,S malaria vaccine, the first to be validated and recommended by the WHO, were delivered to Cameroon on November 21. It took two months to organize the launch of this campaign, in which, according to the government, the malaria shot will be offered free of charge and systematically to all children under six months of age, at the same time as other mandatory or recommended classic vaccinations.