GAVI Alliance and WHO announce yellow fever and child vacc schemes

The GAVI Alliance, a partnership of national governments, international agencies and vaccine manufacturers, has announced a $58.0 million donation to a Yellow Fever Initiative in a dozen West African countries that are at high risk of the disease.

In a statement, the GAVI Alliance, which estimates that it has so far contributed to the saving of 2.3 million deaths in developing countries by the end of 2006, noted that widespread immunization programs in some African countries from the 1940s to the 1960s had "resulted in the almost-complete disappearance of yellow fever." However, with the emergence of generations since 1960 with no immunity for the disease, the World Health Organization estimates that in Lagos, Nigeria, alone, one third of the 4.5 million population is vulnerable to a future outbreak of yellow fever.

In separate news, the GAVI Alliance also announced that six developing nations, (Ghana, Guyana, Madagascar, Malawi, Tanzania and Zambia) had contributed, ahead of schedule, to the cost of local child vaccination programs.