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 A wider campaign to vaccinate more than 10 million people in the
city and along the border with Angola will have to wait at least two
more weeks, however, due to shortages of vaccine and syringes.
"Now I am armored. Now I have the blood of a soldier," said Claudy
Pindi, who is in his forties, holding up his yellow vaccination
card.
Pindi was among the first to be vaccinated in Kinshasa's Kisenso
district, where four people are suspected of having died from yellow
fever.
Congo's health minister declared a yellow fever epidemic last month
after the hemorrhagic virus spread from Angola, where 350 people
have died since last December in the worst outbreak in decades.
Congo had registered 1,798 suspected cases of yellow fever as of
July 11, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), including
85 deaths believed caused by the disease.
Only 68 cases have been laboratory confirmed however, due to a
technical problem over the last three weeks that hindered the
shipping of a chemical used in testing.
Over 100 people queued to be vaccinated on Wednesday under tents set
up by health workers on a soccer pitch in Kisenso. Authorities have
identified around 80 suspected cases of yellow fever there.
Residents of three health zones in Kwango province, which abuts the
Angolan border, will also be vaccinated during the campaign.
"We are very sure we will stop the spread of the virus," said Gedeon
Siama, supervising nurse for the Kisenso health zone. "At the
community level, the monitoring is very active."
The vaccination drive is the second this year after more than two
million people were vaccinated in Kinshasa and Kongo Central
province in late May.
Health officials have also expressed concerns about beginning with
such a targeted approach in Kinshasa, a chaotic megacity of some 12
million people.
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During the last vaccination drive in May, people arrived from
outside targeted areas, preventing some local residents from being
vaccinated and provoking violence outside some health centers.
Eugene Kabambi, a WHO spokesman in Kinshasa, said authorities were
using community leaders and street campaigners with megaphones to
promote the current drive.
"We've avoided a strong publicity campaign. We've focused on word of
mouth communication," he said.
The yellow fever vaccine takes one year to manufacture and there
currently exist just 8 million doses in the world after stocks were
depleted in series of outbreaks earlier this year.
Congo expects to begin receiving more vaccine next month from a
laboratory in Brazil and health officials will administer only
partial doses in some areas to provide immunity of up to a year in
order to most effectively use limited stocks.
(This version of the story corrects number of reported deaths in
sixth paragraph)
(Reporting by Aaron Ross; Editing by Joe Bavier/Jeremy Gaunt)
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