Ghana produces Diphtheria, Tetanus vaccines locally next year – Health Minister

Ghana is to begin the development, production, and distri­bution of Tetanus and Diphtheria Vaccines locally from next year, the Minis­ter of Health, Kwaku Agyemang Manu has announced.

The announcement followed the signing of a Memoran­dum of Understanding (MoU) between Atlantic Life Sciences (ALS), a local pharmaceutical company under the govern­ment’s One District One Factory (1D1F) initiative and PT Biofar­maof Indonnesiaat a ceremony in Accra yesterday.

As part of the MoU signed under the auspices of the Na­tional Vaccine Institute (NVI), PT Biofarma is to provide tech­nical assistance to Atlantic Life Sciences to enable it produce the vaccines locally.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of ALS, Mr Tripathi Dhananjay, signed on behalf of his company while the Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia, Dr Pahala Nugraha Mansury signed on behalf of PT Biofarma.

Speaking at the signing ceremony of the MOU, Mr Agyeman-Manu said the estab­lishment of ALS and what it had achieved so far was a demonstra­tion of the achievement of the visionary agenda of the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

He said as part of the president’s vision of 1D1F, a lot more in the health and pharmaceutical sectors were being accomplished, adding that “the most important thing I may want to tell all of you here is the fact that our President’s dreams and visions are being real­ised from time to time.”

The minister said the signing of the MoU was a step towards the realisation of making the country a vaccine manufacturing hub in the sub-region.

On his part, Dr Mansury said the signing of the MoU marked the start of a journey towards the production of the first-ever vaccine to be produced right here in Ghana.

He said the collaboration be­tween PT Biofarma and Atlantic Lifesciences Ltd signified a com­mitment to excellence, innovation, and a shared responsibility to ensure that life-saving vaccines were accessible to those who need them the most.

PT Biofarma is a world-class, state-owned biomanufacturing company in Indonesia that is well recognised globally for distribut­ing WHO prequalified vaccines to over 150 countries worldwide and having the capacity to produce about 3.2 billion doses of vaccines per year,” he said.

Dr. Mansury noted that Tetanus and Diphtheria were formidable adversaries, and the joint efforts to provide a robust and reliable supply of the vaccine represented a significant stride towards the eradication of these preventable diseases in Africa and the world at large.

Mr Tripathi Dhananjay said records from the World Health Organisation showed that ma­ternal and neonatal tetanus were responsible for an average of 110,000 deaths a year in the African Region.

He noted that of the estimated 28 countries with the highest numbers of maternal and neonatal tetanus cases, 16 of them were in the Afri­can Region, accounting for 90 percent of global neonatal tetanus cases.

“These are Angola, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Cote d’Ivoire, DR Congo, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria and Senegal. In 2022, 5,856 cases of Diphtheria were also reported worldwide,” he emphasised.

Mr. Dhananjay said the signing of this MoU “is one major step we are taking to ensure that the supply of this important vaccine remains uninterrupted even after Ghana exits the GAVI Transition programme by the year 2030.”

Dr Mansury on his part, said the MOU was an important mile­stone for cooperation between Indonesia and Ghana, particularly within the health and pharma­ceutical sector.