Each year over two million children die of pneumonia, the forgotten child killer

Delegates from UAE arrive in UAE to discuss pneumococcal disease in the First Africa & Middle East Pneumococcal Congress

More than 200 world class specialists in the research, diagnosis, treatment and prevention of pneumococcal disease (PD), today attended the first Africa and Middle East (AfME) Pneumococcal Congress held in Dubai, UAE. The conference, which was officially opened by Dr Mahmoud Fikri, Executive Director of Health Policies, UAE Ministry of Health, was dedicated to discussing the incidence of invasive pneumococcal disease, highlighting the burden of pneumonia and the role of vaccination programs in AfME countries as well as discussing protection of children from pneumonia and meningitis through the introduction of new vaccines.

In the United Arab Emirates, five per cent of deaths in children less than five years of age are caused by pneumonia⁴. The introduction of the vaccine means that the 76,000 babies born each year⁶ in UAE will have supported protection from invasive pneumococcal disease – the leading vaccine-preventable cause of death in young children worldwide that kills and disables infants by causing meningitis, pneumonia, sepsis and bacteremia.

Pneumococcal disease describes a group of illnesses caused by the bacterium Streptococcus pneumoniae. The bacteria colonize the upper respiratory tract and can spread to other sites in the body, resulting in several different types of disease:  invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) and non invasive pneumococcal disease². Pneumococcal disease is a major cause of mortality and morbidity and is estimated by the WHO to cause up to 1.6 million deaths each year worldwide.  Approximately half of these deaths occur in children younger than five years of age in the developing world³.

Several classes of antibiotics are active against pneumococci; however, the growing resistance of S. pneumoniae to commonly used antibiotics underscores the need for vaccines to be used to help prevent pneumococcal disease for children up to five years of age. S. pneumoniae accounts for a substantial portion of the estimated two million deaths from pneumonia occurring in children each year. The WHO identified pneumonia as one of the leading causes of death in newborns and children under five years. Pneumonia alone accounts for 19 per cent of deaths in children under five years worldwide³.

There are more than 90 strains (serotypes) of S. pneumoniae, but only a small subset of strains cause the majority of pneumococcal disease. Serotype 19A is an important cause of pneumococcal disease, and recent data have reported increasing rates of disease caused by serotype 19A around the world. In addition, recent studies suggest that some antibiotic-resistant strains of serotype 19A are emerging⁸. Serotype represents now around 36 per cent of invasive pneumococcal diseases in USA in children under five years and from 5-20 per cent in most of European countries¹⁰.

“Antibiotic resistance is now a serious public health concern with economic, social, and political implications that are global in scope”. Said Dr. Mona Al Mosawi, Chief of Disease Control Section, Ministry of Health, Bahrain during the congress. “The WHO has acknowledged that vaccines offer the best hope for combating resistance by reducing the number of infected individuals and thereby minimizing transmission, infection, and need for treatment. This can reduce the need for antibiotics, which in turn can reduce the selection for and spread of resistant microbes⁹” she added.

Based on the success of this year’s congress and demands from around 200 attending delegates from around the region, The Africa and Middle East Pneumococcal Congress is expected to become an annual event.