‘We need to address mpox at the source’, says children charity

We spoke to Greg Ramm, Save The Children’s Democratic Republic of the Congo’s country director.

Ciaran Jenkins: 96% of the cases and deaths are where you are, in the Democratic Republic of Congo. How grave is the situation?

Greg Ramm: The situation is very serious here. The disease is growing. It is spreading. And the majority of people who are getting the disease and the majority of people who are dying are children, and we are very concerned about that.

Ciaran Jenkins: How has it been spreading? Because we’ve been hearing about these trucker routes, where there are truckers and sex workers, and that’s carrying it beyond communities, beyond borders.

Greg Ramm: What’s happening here in eastern Congo is it’s spreading more communally. It’s spreading in families. It is clearly contagious within families from close contact. More than seven million people in the Congo are internally displaced, living in crowded conditions, often in displacement camps, and it’s very easy for a disease like this to spread through close contact in those situations.

Ciaran Jenkins: How concerning is this new strain, this new variant?

Greg Ramm: Each strain has its own aspects, and I know that the health researchers are looking carefully at those. Both strains are prevalent here in the Congo and are at risk of spreading further. We’re particularly concerned about those that are spreading in eastern Congo, in the displacement camps, in places where there is already a severe humanitarian crisis, where health systems are overstretched and where children are getting it through contact in their community, with friends, with family. And that’s what we need to really address in the first instance.

Ciaran Jenkins: This has been going on in the Democratic Republic of Congo, hasn’t it, for some time? There’s been hundreds of deaths last year also.

Greg Ramm: As mentioned in your earlier report, mpox is endemic here. What we’re seeing now is higher death rates and higher case rates than we’ve seen in a very long time. And it also has spread both in the region and now beyond the continent, and therefore what’s most important is try to address it at its source, here in the Congo where children and their families need help, need protection.

Ciaran Jenkins: Are you getting that support to address it at source? Are you getting the vaccinations?

Greg Ramm: In the first instance, right at the moment, there are not enough. There are very few vaccinations here and many more vaccinations need to be produced. They need to be brought here to the Congo and given to people, particularly those that are most vulnerable. The health workers, the nurses and the doctors we work with, who are the frontline of this disease and who are not being protected. But in the absence of vaccine, there are many more things we can do. We can make sure that health clinics are safe, that they receive the infection control required. That health workers, the nurses have, the community health workers have, protective gear. And we can get an accurate message about what it takes to stop the spread of this disease.

Ciaran Jenkins: There was an outbreak in 2022 as well, wasn’t there, and the world at first didn’t seem to do much to help Africa. Do you think we’re making the same mistakes? Why isn’t the world stepping up?

Greg Ramm: It’s a very common problem, isn’t it? Until it’s on your doorstep, you often don’t pay much attention. At Save the Children, we work around the world, wherever the children are in greatest need. and we believe that all children have a right to a basic childhood, to live and to grow and to thrive. And it’s diseases like this that is often ignored. That needs attention, it needs support, that needs help. And it is sad that it takes a case spreading throughout the world to get attention, but that still is a good thing when that happens.

Ciaran Jenkins: And just briefly, based on what you’ve seen of how contagious this new variant is in Africa, how concerned should Europe be that it will spread here to?

Greg Ramm: I think what we found is that when messages get out in Europe, it can be much more easily controlled with the health resources that are there. The much greater concern is in those places where the health systems are much, much weaker and where there’s already other diseases, such as malaria, children dying from malnutrition. And that’s where the focus of our energy needs to be.