HEALTH - The African Mirror

Feb

07

2021

Nigeria lifts Emirates flight suspension

COVID-19

LIBBY GEORGE and ALEXIS AKWAGYIRAM NIGERIA has lifted its suspension of Emirates airlines flights imposed after the carrier sought additional COVID-19 tests for passengers from Nigeria, a spokesman for the country's aviation regulator has said. "The suspension has just been lifted, because they have complied with what we want," said the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) spokesman in a phone call. He said further details would soon be made public in a statement. An Emirates spokesperson said the company "can confirm that we will continue to operate services to Abuja and Lagos." An aviation ministry spokesman on Monday told a…

Feb

07

2021

By The African Mirror

“Share vaccine-making capacity”

COVID-19

WORLD Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has called on more pharmaceutical companies to share manufacturing facilities to help ramp up the production of COVID-19 vaccines. The WHO also said its technical advisers would meet next week to assess versions of the AstraZeneca vaccine from the Serum Institute of India (SII), the largest vaccine maker, and from South Korea's SK Bioscience ahead of a possible WHO emergency listing. Speaking at an online news briefing from Geneva, Tedros said almost 130 countries with a combined population of 2.5 billion people were yet to administer any vaccines, and repeated his plea for…

Feb

06

2021

By The African Mirror

South Africa looks to curb TB infections amid COVID-19 disruptions

HEALTH

SOUTH Africa will ramp up home delivery of medicines to patients and expand the use of chest X-rays for tuberculosis (TB) screening in communities as it looks to contain new infections since the COVID-19 pandemic severely disrupted health services, the health minister said yesterday. Designated by the World Health Organization as a high burden country, South Africa registers around 60,000 deaths from TB each year, making it the country's leading infectious disease killer closely intertwined with one of the world's highest rates of HIV/Aids. As COVID-19 pummelled South Africa since first being detected in March last year, many TB clinics…

Feb

06

2021

By The African Mirror

South Africa secures vaccines for 26 million people

COVID-19

SOUTH Africa has secured enough COVID-19 vaccines for at least 26 million people, Health Minister Zweli Mkhize disclosed yesterday. Africa's most industrialised economy aims to vaccinate 40 million people, or two-thirds of its population, to reach herd immunity. It has recorded the most coronavirus infections and deaths on the African continent, and received its first shots of the AstraZeneca vaccine from India this week. A health ministry presentation said the government had signed a term sheet for 9 million doses of Johnson & Johnson's vaccine at $10 a dose. One of the conditions for J&J's vaccine was the establishment of…

Feb

13

2021

By The African Mirror

Gabon tightens COVID-19 restrictions

COVID-19

GABON has restricted travel in and out of its capital city, and expanded curfew hours to limit travel and slow the spread of coronavirus infections, Interior Minister Lambert Noel Matha said yesterday. Matha told a news conference that curfew hours have been extended by two hours, now starting at 6 p.m. local time (1700 GMT) until 0500 GMT. He said travellers in and out of Libreville and neighbouring municipalities are now required to present a negative COVID-19 test because of the rising number of cases. Coronavirus cases in Gabon are at 73% of peak and rising, according to Reuters data.…

Feb

13

2021

By The African Mirror

Senegal purchases 200 000 vaccines

COVID-19

DIADIE BA SENEGAL has paid a little over 2 billion CFA francs ($3.72 million) - or nearly $19 per shot - for 200,000 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine developed by China's Sinopharm, a finance ministry spokesman told Reuters yesterday. African nations are struggling to source vaccines in the face of a global scramble for doses. Coverage secured through African Union (AU) and World Health Organization-backed (WHO) schemes so far falls short of the continent's needs. Senegal said in January it was in talks to buy the Chinese vaccine. Finance ministry spokesman Balle Preira confirmed the cost of the shots, which…

Feb

13

2021

By The African Mirror

Variant-modified vaccines on track

COVID-19

EMILIO PARODI EUROPE's medicines regulator is planning to speed up assessments of any COVID-19 vaccines that are modified to protect against variants of the virus, the head of the agency's COVID-19 task-force told Reuters yesterday. Marco Cavaleri, chair of the vaccine evaluation team at the European Medicines Agency (EMA), said there should be no need for lengthy large-scale trials like those needed to evaluate the first COVID-19 vaccines, since tweaks for new variants can be tested on smaller groups. "We are working on updated guidelines, assuming that we cannot ask for large Phase III trials. This will allow us to…

Aug

06

2021

By The African Mirror

Africa’s COVID vaccine project takes a step forward with bottling agreement

COVID-19

FRANCESCO GUARASCIO SENEGAL’S Institut Pasteur of Dakar (IPD) has reached a deal with U.S. company MedInstill for the bottling of COVID-19 shots, an EU document shows, marking a step to becoming a fully-fledged maker of coronavirus vaccines for Africa. The European Union is a major financial backer of the project which aims to enable IPD to manufacture 300 million COVID-19 vaccines a year and reduce Africa's reliance on imported vaccines. IPD, however, has yet to secure a partnership with a COVID vaccine patent holder to produce shots. African countries have so far received a tiny portion of COVID-19 shots produced…

Aug

06

2021

By The African Mirror

Moderna says its shot remains 93% effective

COVID-19

MICHAEL ERMAN MODERNA Inc has revealed that its COVID-19 shot was about 93% effective four to six months after the second dose, showing hardly any change from the 94% efficacy reported in its original clinical trial. That compares favourably to data released by rivals Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE last week in which they suggested their vaccine's efficacy waned around 6% every two months, declining to around 84% six months after the second shot. Both the Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines are based on messenger RNA (mRNA) technology. "We are very pleased that our COVID-19 vaccine efficacy is stable at 93%…

Feb

13

2021

By The African Mirror

What’s in the way of quality antenatal care for women in West and Central Africa

HEALTH

GLOBALLY, nearly 300,000 women die from pregnancy-related causes each year. Most of these deaths are in the low-income countries of sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. COMFORT Z. OLORUNSAIYE, Assistant Professor of Public Health, Arcadia University The leading causes of maternal mortality include severe bleeding, hypertensive disorders, infection, unsafe abortion and embolism. There are also indirect causes such as HIV, malaria and anaemia. About three in four maternal deaths could be prevented if women had adequate access to quality care before, during and after pregnancy. Quality antenatal care can save lives by identifying and addressing health problems that can cause pregnancy…