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June EYE Strategy Newsletter
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Breakthrough for arboviral diseases
The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) (1) published a study last month on the introduction of Wolbachia-infected mosquitos into the city of Yogyakarta, Indonesia, and its impact on reducing cases and hospitalizations of dengue. Wolbachia are symbiotic bacteria, which reduce the mosquitoes' ability to transmit viruses like dengue, Zika, chikungunya and yellow fever (YF).
The study showed a drop in dengue incidences of 77%.
WHO’s Vector Control Advisory Group concluded that the evidence presented by the applicants on wMel strain of Wolbachia, which steadily increased in the population of Aedes aegypti after periodic release, demonstrates public health value against dengue. This randomised control trial (RCT) is the first demonstration of an innovative vector control tool capable of suppressing dengue transmission.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared that half of the world's population is at risk of dengue, with an estimated 100-400 million infections each year (2). Like urban YF, dengue is transmitted via the Aedes aegypti mosquito.
In his editorial for the NJEM (3), Davidson H. Hamer, M.D. shed some light on the potential reach of the study, stating “this strategy could also be applied in the future for the prevention of other common alphavirus and flavivirus infections, including infection from chikungunya, YF, and Zika viruses.”.
(1) Efficacy of Wolbachia-Infected Mosquito Deployments for the Control of Dengue | NEJM
(2) Dengue and severe dengue (who.int)
(3) Dengue — Perils and Prevention | NEJM
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Vaccination campaigns against yellow fever in three counties of Central Equatoria State, South Sudan, June 2021. Credit: WHO Photo Library
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South Sudan
Last month, we reported on the upcoming YF vaccination campaigns in South Sudan. Over 56 000 individuals were successfully vaccinated in Morobo, Lainya and Yei River Counties of Central Equatoria State. These preventive mass vaccination campaigns (PMVCs) were in reponse to the 2020 YF outbreak.
“Yellow Fever remains a major public health concern in South Sudan and its re-emergence especially at the time the country is responding to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic places more burden on the health system and is something to be worried about,” said Dr John Rumunu, Director General for Preventive Health Service. “We thank WHO and our health partners for ensuring that our people are vaccinated against yellow fever.”
The preventive campaigns were part of the EYE strategy’s measures to work towards high population immunity in high-risk countries, such as South Sudan. You can read more here.
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Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)
The yellow fever vaccination campaigns that have been completed so far have achieved a high level of coverage with over 15.5 million people protected. Blocs 1 and 2 have been completed with the exception of Equateur. Preparations for Bloc 3 have been underway for the Equateur activities for some time, but have been postponed from July to August, and seek to approximately target an additional 2.6 million people.
Republic of Congo
There is a risk of delay to the implementation of the YF vaccinations in the Republic of Congo (originally planned for October 2021), due to competing campaigns. For the meantime, the Government is prioritizing polio and COVID-19 vaccination campaigns. The YF campaigns will aim to target over 4 million people.
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Laboratory
Nigeria national reference laboratory accreditation for molecular testing (Gaduwa)
We are pleased to announce that the National Reference Laboratory of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) in Gaduwa, Abuja, has been accredited for yellow fever molecular testing. This makes it the first National Laboratory to be accredited in Africa for confirmatory YF testing via molecular testing, while serological testing still needs confirmation by a regional reference laboratory (Institut Pasteur Dakar (IPD), in this case).
The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has made great progress in its vision for supporting the EYE Strategy, with serology accreditations earlier this year for the NCDC’s National Reference Laboratory and Central Public Health Laboratory in Lagos, as well as the Yusuf Dantsoho Laboratory in Kaduna.
We call on you, as partners and valued members of our network, to actively engage in advocacy efforts to ensure that countries request accreditation visits. We hope that the greater visibility of the laboratory accreditation status provided by the EYE dashboard (see below) for the YF laboratory network will also encourage countries seeking accreditation. If you are interested in arranging an accreditation visit, please contact Maurice Demanou, the yellow fever regional laboratory coordinator at Cette adresse e-mail est protégée contre les robots spammeurs. Vous devez activer le JavaScript pour la visualiser. and the EYE Secretariat at Cette adresse e-mail est protégée contre les robots spammeurs. Vous devez activer le JavaScript pour la visualiser.
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Diagnostics
The EYE Laboratory Technical Working Group has validated for use in the YF laboratory network, a commercially available PCR test kit from Altona Diagnostics. This is the first test kit for the detection of YF to be validated for use by the laboratory network.
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Read more about Altona’s RealStar YF RT-PCR kit performance in the attached public report, which describes the outcome of an evaluation performed by the top-tier laboratory of the global YF laboratory network; the laboratory from the arbovirus disease branch of the US-CDC in Fort Collins, Colorado. Read more here.
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Country twinning programme survey
3rd EYE Annual Partners’ Meeting 2019, Brasília
We are taking the next steps in planning the EYE country twinning programme. The vision for the programme is to enable knowledge sharing, capability and capacity enhancing across the global network and between countries. In order to do this, we need to hear your views on what you need and envision from such a programme. Pleaseclick here to complete the survey and have your say.
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August
A 3-day data harmonization workshop is being organized with the YF Regional Reference Laboratories (RRLs) in Yaounde, Cameroon, and will be hosted by Centre Pasteur du Cameroun (CPC)
September
A regional combined molecular & serology workshop training is being organized for English-speaking African countries in Entebbe, Uganda, hosted by the Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI)
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October
A regional combined Molecular & Serology training workshop is being organized for French-speaking African countries in Dakar, Senegal hosted by Institut Pasteur Dakar (IPD)
The 7th Annual Laboratory Technical Working Group (LTWG) meeting is scheduled for Monday 18th and Tuesday 19th October, 2021
The 5th EYE Annual Partners’ Meeting will take place on the 25th, 26th and 27th of October from 3.00pm to 5.30pm Central European Time (CET)
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New joiners
The EYE family is growing. We welcome our June newcomers.
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Peter Ebongue Mbondji
Readiness, Preparedness & Response Consultant (Cameroon)
Peter is developing comprehensive technical guidelines for preparedness, readiness, and response planning for YF outbreaks in urban settings.
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Rebecca Mary Casey
Immunization and Risk Analysis Consultant (Atlanta, USA)
Rebecca is working with the EYE Secretariat and the EYE Risk Analysis Working Group (RAWG), as well as supporting the EYE / Immunization Agenda 2030 (IA 2030) task team.
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Jean-Francois Lemaire
Technical Officer, Laboratory (Geneva)
Jean-Francois Lemaire has recently joined the Surveillance team at the Department of Immunization Vaccines and Biologicals (IVB). He is now the YF laboratory focal point.
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Franck Stephane Tenekeu Mbeh
EYE Learning Strategy Consultant (Cameroon)
Franck has joined the EYE Secretariat to help develop its learning and development strategy.
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Yamila Romer
Consultant (Atlanta, USA)
Yamila has joined the Pan American Health Organization region to support the implementation of the EYE strategy in Latin America and the Caribbean.
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This month's EYE mask challenge ‘shout out’ goes to our partners UNICEF/ West and Central Africa, who are looking good and staying safe in our EYE masks.
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Tell us your news!
We would love to showcase the work you are doing on protecting people from yellow fever. To submit your news, stories, photos and videos, please email Cette adresse e-mail est protégée contre les robots spammeurs. Vous devez activer le JavaScript pour la visualiser.
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