Khartoum, 1 June 2016 - The State leadership of the Federal Ministry of Health in Sudan with the support of WHO and partnerships launched, on 22 May 2016, a 10-day subnational measles campaign targeting more than 4 million children aged six months to 15 years in 6 States in Sudan. This campaign, which is being implemented in (West Kordufan, Blue Nile, North Kordofan, South Kordofan, White Nile, and Sennar), is complementary to previous measles immunization rounds carried out in 2015 in 10 states targeting 9 525  441 children under 15 years old.

“WHO and UNICEF will continue collaboration to support the Federal Ministry of Health in this endeavour. WHO full cycle of technical support, as well as UNICEF’s procurement of vaccine and social mobilization management will certainly back the immunization programme in Sudan and achieve the desired results” said Dr Naeema Al Gasseer, WHO Representative and Head of Mission in Sudan. “Such support is a long-standing partnership between the Federal Ministry of Health, WHO, UNICEF, and other partners. Such partnership is welcomed to protect health especially of children.” Dr Al Gasseer added.

The campaign focuses on the newly displaced population from South Sudan and who are accommodated within the hosting communities in the target 6 bordering States.

A team of WHO experts were mobilized to support the campaign technically through direct supervision and monitoring activities for a high-quality campaign and to meet the campaign objectives and reach the expected results.

The measles vaccination campaigns conducted in 2015 have contributed significantly to the reduction in measles cases in 2016. A total of 2498 cases in 2015 was scaled down to 1073 reducing, as a result, the case fatality rate in States of The Red Sea and Central and West Darfur especially.