Aid Groups Fight African Meningitis Plague

International and local aid agencies started a vaccination effort in the Central African Republic to curb an outbreak of meningitis, a U.N. agency said.

A United Nations humanitarian affairs agency said Monday meningitis has spread across the northwestern districts in the Central African Republic, threatening up to 1 million people.

The top U.N. humanitarian coordinator, Toby Lanzer, said the vaccination campaign targets about 80,000 people at the center of the epidemic, the humanitarian news network for the United Nations, IRIN, said Wednesday.

Ruhala Bissimwa, a medical coordinator in Kaga Bandoro for the London-based aid group Medical Emergency Relief International, said health workers are very worried, very afraid the situation will continue to worsen because of the slow pace of vaccinations.

The region is situated in the central African meningitis belt and the United Nations said annual outbreaks occur in the region during the dry season, which lasts from January to May.

Aid agencies said less than a quarter of the population have access to healthcare and the people there have one of the lowest life expectancies in the world.

Meningitis, which attacks the protective membranes covering the central nervous system, is lethal in 10 percent of cases.