The Rwanda Food and Drug Authority (FDA) on Friday, November 27 concluded a meeting that had been hosted to discuss the safety of vaccines administered to patients. The meeting also aimed at clarifying roles and responsibilities for each party involved from the community level up to the national level. “Participants in the training of trainers included the Pharmacovigilance Advisory Committee and members from districts hospitals who have been trained recently in AEFI surveillance whereas the training of health care providers will consist of those from different hospitals in Rwanda,” read part of the information from the FDA. EAFI is short for Adverse Drug Event Following Immunization. “Rwanda FDA recognizes that establishing and strengthening the AEFI surveillance system requires a joint effort from all partners and stakeholders with the overall aim of the safety of our population,” reads a statement from the agency. According to FDA, during this period of evolving epidemics around the world, new vaccines are being discovered and developed as well as applied in routine vaccination, hence calls for a robust AEFI surveillance system in the country with clear responsibilities of stakeholders. Meanwhile, considering the Covid-19 pandemic, the world is looking at rolling out vaccination among people as some vaccine candidates have recently reported good effectiveness. Among these, American drugmaker Pfizer and German pharmaceutical company BioNTech recently announced data analysis shows their Covid-19 vaccine candidate is more than 90 per cent effective in preventing Covid-19 in participants without evidence of prior SARS-CoV-2 infection.
