Mozambique ran the third round of a polio outbreak response campaign July 7-10. The 65,000-worker effort sent vaccinators door to door and to crowded areas (including daycare centers, markets, churches and hospitals) to reach about 7 million children under age 5. The national campaign is part of a regional four-round vaccination drive launched earlier this year in response to a wild poliovirus outbreak in Malawi (Mozambique later declared its own outbreak after a case surfaced).
Overall, the regional effort aims to administer over 80 million bivalent oral polio vaccine (bOPV) doses to more than 23 million children across five countries (Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe). In Tanzania, vaccinators are gathering data with Open Data Kit (ODK) mobile tools to help inform and implement upcoming phases. Malawi, Tanzania and Zambia are set to embark shortly on the third phases of their campaigns. All Africa; Xinhua; WHO; WHO