Humanitarian emergencies, regardless of type and cause, have a number of common risk factors for communicable diseases inextricably linked to excess risk of morbidity and mortality which can come from vaccine-preventable diseases.

Vaccine-preventable disease outbreaks occurring in humanitarian emergencies highlighted the need for a comprehensive and evidence-based decision-making framework for vaccination in humanitarian emergencies. In 2013, “Vaccination in acute humanitarian emergencies: a framework for decision making” was developed by the World Health Organization (WHO). The ultimate aim of the framework is to assist the user to thoughtfully, deliberately, ethically, and rationally determine whether the delivery of one or more vaccines to specific target populations during the acute phase of an emergency would result in an overall saving of lives, a reduction in the population burden of disease, and generally more favourable outcomes than would otherwise be the case.

Through a series of consultations with partners in 2016 the following has been accomplished: (i) “Vaccination in acute humanitarian emergencies: a framework for decision making” has been revised and updated, (ii) “Vaccination in humanitarian emergencies implementation guide” has been developed, and (iii) country case studies have been collected.

These two guidance documents provide a complementary package. In addition, a set of interactive tools is currently being developed to facilitate the use of this package and to keep its content up to date.

A “Humanitarian Mechanism” has been developed by WHO, UNICEF, Médecins Sans Frontières, and Save the Children to enable civil society organizations, governments and UN agencies to quickly procure affordable vaccine supplies on behalf of populations facing humanitarian emergencies and who do not have such access. The mechanism is available for use as of 1 May 2017.