Implications of conflict on vaccination in the Sahel region

Abstract

The Sahel region is a geographical belt in Africa that stretches from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea, between the Sahara Desert in the north and the Savannah in the south. It is characterised by challenging environmental crises and conflicts. This analysis highlights the potential implications of conflict on vaccination across five Sahel countries, including Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Niger and Sudan, from 2019 to 2023. It also presents recommendations to improve vaccination coverage in these settings. The WHO Immunisation Data Portal was used to extract data about vaccination coverage and disease outbreaks. With the increasing complexity of humanitarian access in the Sahel, there has been an accumulation of the number of zero-dose and underimmunised children. In 2023 alone, most of these countries had a significant proportion of zero-dose children, particularly Sudan (43%), Mali (22%) and Chad (16%). Nearly half of children in Sudan (49%), 33% in Chad and 23% in Mali are underimmunised. Measles vaccine coverage was consistently below 90% in these countries, except for Burkina Faso. The trend of polio outbreaks (circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus) across these countries showed fluctuations in the number of cases, with Niger having reported several cases over this period, and Chad having 101 cases reported in 2020 alone. Despite relatively high coverage, there were significant outbreaks of polio in Burkina Faso, Sudan and Mali in 2020, which reflects the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Lessons can be learnt from past diplomatic and programmatic successes, while investments in innovative and flexible approaches may help increase the reach of vaccination programmes in inaccessible areas.