Yellow fever boosters abolished

Travellers will no longer have to renew their yellow fever vaccination every 10 years after the World Health Organisation (WHO) said the booster is not needed.The yellow fever booster vaccination is given 10 years after the initial vaccination.The Organisation’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on immunisation reviewed the latest evidence and concluded that a single dose of vaccination is sufficient to confer life-long immunity against yellow fever disease.This therefore means a person will only have to get one dose of yellow fever vaccination.According to the statement, since yellow fever vaccination began in the 1930s, only 12 known cases of yellow fever post-vaccination have been identified, after 600 million doses have been dispensed.Although Rwanda is considered an endemic country, there has been no case of yellow fever since the 1950s, according to Dr. Thierry Nyatanyi, the Head of Division and Epidemic Infectious Diseases at Rwanda Biomedical Centre.Good move“An assessment between WHO and the Ministry of Health was recently carried out to ascertain whether Rwanda should be officially declared yellow fever-free or not. We hope to get the results at least by August this year,” he told The New Times.He, however, noted that if neighbouring countries are at high risk then at times it affects the country with no cases.Emmanuel Ndemezo, who has travelled to different countries noted that removing the booster vaccination is a good move by WHO because it is time consuming and expensive. “There are some countries one enters and they are fined for not having a card,” he said. “Then these government officials hand you a card to show you have been vaccinated without getting the vaccine.”Yellow fever is an acute viral hemorrhagic disease transmitted by infected mosquitoes that is endemic to 44 countries in tropical areas of Africa and the Americas.The disease is categorised among the epidemics transmitted by vectors. The yellow fever virus is transmitted by a female mosquito.Infection with the yellow fever virus causes varying degrees of disease, from mild symptoms to severe illness with bleeding and jaundice and fatal outcomes. Some of its symptoms include vomiting blood, headaches, backaches, fever, nausea and slow pulse.

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Yellow fever boosters abolished