The Regional Office for Africa (AFRO), WHO Geneva in collaboration with WHO Namibia and the Ministry of Health and Social Services conducted a training on Global Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) and Use surveillance system (GLASS) and WHONET tool in Windhoek, for 12 selected member states. The training aimed to build capacity of Member States to establish and/or enhance national surveillance systems for AMR and generate, collect, report, and use quality data to inform decisions at the country, regional and global levels.  

In a bid to strengthen global health security, the World Health Organization (WHO) has concluded a comprehensive assessment of Angola's readiness and response to health threats. This initiative, the Joint External Evaluation (JEE), took place between 25th and 29th September 2023.

The Yellow Fever sub-national risk analysis findings dissemination workshop, and consultative and advocacy meeting was held in Addis Ababa Ethiopia on 4th October 2023. The workshop was organized by World Health Organization (WHO) Ethiopia in collaboration with Ministry of Health (MoH) and global and in-country partners. 

Today, we commemorate the 2023 World Polio Day (WPD) by joining the global community to create awareness about polio eradication and urge parents to vaccinate their children. We,– the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, and ROTARY – reaffirm our commitment to continue delivering on our promise until polio is eliminated in Ethiopia.

Likoma-Malawi government has today launched the National Community Health Framework (2023-2030), the “Tipewe Cholera/Covid 19” campaign and re-launched the Human Papilloma virus vaccination drive.

Abuja, 24 October 2023 – Nigeria today introduced the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine into its routine immunization system, aiming to reach 7.7 million girls – the largest number in a single round of HPV vaccination in the African region – in a vaccination drive against the virus that causes nearly all cases of cervical cancer. 

Girls aged 9–14 years will receive a single dose of the vaccine, which is highly efficacious in preventing infection with HPV types 16 and 18 that are known to cause at least 70% of cervical cancers. 

In the early afternoon of 9 September, Catarino Francisco is coordinating the work of 12 monitors in the urban district of Ngola Kiluanje, whose task is to monitor the level of implementation of the polio vaccination campaign to the target group of children under five years.

Analysis of vaccination coverage data for bivalent oral polio and inactivated polio for the period from 2022 to the first quarter of 2023 shows that children's immunity to poliovirus types 1, 2 and 3 is currently low in Angola, estimated at less than 60%.

Catarino Estêvão Fernandes Francisco, 21, is in his third year of medicine at the Private University of Angola (UPRA). He always dreamed of becoming a neurosurgeon. 

But the experience of working in Luanda on the national polio vaccination campaign, which ran from 8 to 11 September 2023, has given him another dream. "I want to do field work, observe patients and help the most vulnerable people. I don't want to sit in a doctor's surgery. I want to work in public health."

Luanda, 24^th of October, 2023 ‒ In the neighborhood of Caope Velha, in the municipality of Cacuaco in Luanda, Elisa António de Melo, 70, is carrying a baby girl in her arms. She is waiting with her two granddaughters and four great-grandchildren for the polio vaccine to be administered to the children. De Melo does not know the details of the vaccine's effects, but she can tell you it's a lifesaver.