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The first cold chain vaccination storage system

Ghana was the first country where the World Health Organisation trialled its cold chain to help keep vaccines refrigerated, for immunisation against serious diseases.

In 1974, Ghana pioneered a new system which would help in the roll-out of the immunisation of serious diseases across Africa and the rest of the world. The World Health Organisation chose the country to trial its cold chain system, to help keep vaccines for often deadly diseases refrigerated. It would later evolve into the storage systems used to cope with the Covid-19 pandemic.

Justice Baidoo meets Patience Azuma, who was one of the first children to benefit from the Enhanced Immunisation Programme in the 1970s and Dr Kofi Ahmed later a chief medical officer, who helped in the original cold storage system roll out.

A Made in Manchester Production for ´óÏó´«Ã½ World Service.

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(Photo: A man being vaccinated in Ghana. Credit: Junior Asiama / 500px)

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