African Leaders Worry About an India-like COVID-19 Wave

ADF STAFF

African public health experts are closely watching India’s surge in COVID-19 cases out of concern that Africa could face a similar fate if vaccination rates fail to rise.

“Here on the African continent, there is the potential for a surge in cases,” Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, director of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Africa regional office, said during a recent press conference. “What’s happening in India must not happen here.”

In recent weeks, India has experienced a huge wave of COVID-19 infections and deaths that have crippled the nation’s health system and set funeral pyres burning day and night. The wave is associated with a new COVID-19 variant — B.1.617 — that already has begun appearing in Africa, with reports of it in Kenya, Morocco and Uganda.

As a result of the Indian outbreak, the country has paused vaccine exports. The Serum Institute of India has been the primary vaccine source for the international COVAX facility, which has provided vaccines to more than 40 African countries.

India’s export pause has cost African nations more than 140 million vaccine doses since March, according to Thabani Maphosa, managing director for country programs at Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.

Maphosa said WHO is reaching out to other vaccine makers to fill the gap. Some countries also have begun donating surplus doses to African countries to make up the shortfall.

“With delays and shortages of vaccine supplies, African countries are slipping farther behind the rest of the world in the COVID-19 vaccine rollout,” Moeti said.

At least 10 countries are experiencing an uptick in COVID-19 cases. In Ethiopia and Botswana, Moeti said, intensive-care capabilities are being pushed to their limits. She urged countries to scale up their clinical and intensive care unit capabilities.

“This will have benefits for COVID-19 and other life-threatening conditions,” she said.

Until recently, Africa accounted for 2% of vaccinations administered worldwide. Now, the continent has fallen to 1%, according to Dr. John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

As of early May, African nations reported 4.5 million cases of COVID-19 and more than 123,000 deaths. The continent’s case-fatality rate of 2.7% is above the global average of 2.1%.

As Southern Africa moves into winter, public health officials worry that another wave of infections and fatalities might be on the horizon. South Africa, the nation with the continent’s highest concentration of COVID-19 cases, accounted for one-fifth of the 65,000 new cases recorded in Africa during the first week of May.

As of May 4, African countries had received more than 37.6 million vaccine doses and administered about half of them. That covered just over 1% of the population.

Overall, Africa has the lowest vaccination rate of any region in the world, Moeti said.

Vaccination rates vary widely across the continent, from 11.7% in Morocco to less than 0.25% in Egypt. Some countries, such as Nigeria, have used less than one-third of the vaccines provided to them by COVAX and other groups.

As vaccines go unused, some doses are reaching their expiration date, prompting countries such as South Sudan and Malawi to consider destroying them even as public health officials plead with them to avoid that.

Moeti urged countries to prioritize vaccines for people at high risk of dying from COVID-19.

“We need to get the available vaccines into people’s arms fast,” Moeti said.