Following mass population displacements in South Sudan, preventive cholera vaccination campaigns were conducted in displaced persons camps before a 2014 cholera outbreak. We compare cholera transmission in vaccinated and unvaccinated areas and show vaccination likely halted transmission within vaccinated areas, illustrating the potential for oral cholera vaccine to stop cholera transmission in vulnerable populations.

A global oral cholera vaccine (OCV) stockpile was established in 2013 to improve rapid access to the vaccine in outbreaks and emergencies in which cholera risk is high. The first deployment from the global OCV stockpile was to South Sudan in 2014 because of high cholera risk from massive population displacements within the civil war.  256,700 doses of OCV were delivered, with high coverage, throughout the country as part of a comprehensive cholera prevention strategy by multiple agencies, some of which had little to no previous experience with this vaccine.

It is important to note that this is a draft plan which will require ongoing revision to ensure it is a current and effective tool to apply in the course of a pandemic. However, we also hope that the drafted avian and human influenza pandemic preparedness plan will be useful for several relevant agencies in Chiang Rai and other provinces who may wish to use it as an example and/or to modify it to suit their organizational needs.