Fight Against Lineage 1 Rinderpest Virus Project in Southern Sudan.

During year one the project has focussed on introducing the strategy for the eradication ofrinderpest from Sudan to all stakeholders, ensuring that mass rinderpest vaccination stoppedin line with the strategy, improving outbreak reporting and investigation systems, introducingcommunity-based surveillance systems, and developing emergency preparedness systems incase of a rinderpest outbreak. Training has been provided for CAHWs, supervisors and fieldveterinarians, and community dialogue has been carried out and communication materialsdisseminated. The project has supported regional co-ordination meetings and facilitatedsessions on rinderpest eradication, and organized a review and planning meetings for projectco-ordinators and counterparts in Nairobi. Rinderpest outbreak rumours have been followedup and there have been no confirmed cases of rinderpest so far in 2002. Some plannedactivities were not carried out so they have been rescheduled to be carried out in year two e.g.wildlife surveillance.During the year, there has been an increase in the areas under rebel-control, when some keytowns in eastern Equatoria were taken over by the SPLA. This has expanded the area thatneeds to be covered by the project. In addition there are areas outside the southern region ofSudan that are not under government control and therefore it will be difficult for thegovernment to carry out surveillance and verify absence of rinderpest in these areas e.g.SPLA areas of Nuba mountains and Southern Blue Nile and parts of north-eastern Sudanunder NDA control. The project proposes to make linkages with agencies working in theseareas to ensure their participation in rinderpest eradication, develop systems for outbreakreporting and investigation, and carry out surveillance visits to the areas. As a result of the expansion of rinderpest eradication activities, the project plans to utilisesome of the funds that were unspent during year one to employ an additional fieldveterinarian with the necessary support to assist in covering the additional areas.The focus for year two is to continue to develop and refine the systems for outbreak reportingand investigation, surveillance and emergency preparedness, to ensure that if rinderpest virusis still present that it is identified and action taken, and, if it is no longer present, to start tobuild up evidence that Sudan is free of rinderpest.