Guest: Fungai Musaigwa | PhD candidate the Department of Pathology at University of Cape Town
While vaccine coverage of the African continent is still low there is an added worry, the effectiveness of vaccines in developing countries, particularly those with very high levels of chronic parasitic infections. Schistosomiasis for instance - about 90% of the people requiring treatment for this debilitating parasite are sub-Saharan Africans. For this reason treatment for schistosomiasis should be considered an important part of SARS-CoV-2 vaccination campaigns where the parasite is commonly found.