The World Health Organisation (WHO) has affirmed that immunisation averts two to three million deaths worldwide annually. But the politicisation of its implementation process, vaccinators focus on financial benefits and poor skills of implementors are among hurdles limiting its optimal benefits. ELEAZAR NWANTIreports
“We do not know what is happening. We are tired because you hear one child had died in this family and as you are going to condole with the family, another family would cry out that its child has died also.
The disease is ravaging our area, and we did not have anyone to run to. My children were killed by the disease. They were vomiting blood. I did not know what name to call the disease.”
That was the voice of Anago Benedict who lost three of her children to measles in Otodo- Gbame community in Ikate, Lekki area of Lagos State where children died in scores because they missed immunisation.
The tragic events occurred between January and February. Immunisation is the process whereby a person is made immune or resistant to an infectious disease, typically by the administration of a vaccine.
Vaccines stimulate the body’s own immune system to protect the person against subsequent infection or disease.
However, as Nigeria joined the rest of the international community to mark the 2016 World Immunisation Week which is commemorated from April 21 to 28, facts have emerged on why some children miss out on immunisation in the country.
According to a Vocal Person on Immunisation and Senior Nursing Officer at the Ikotun Primary Health Care Center, Alimosho Local Government Area ( LGA), Lagos State, Mrs. Fatima Bello acknowledged that immunisation as a major way of fighting contagious diseases and praised the potency of vaccines used for immunisation.
She said: “The vaccines are potent; they help in the fight against infectious diseases. Here we also have a massive turn-out during immunisation.”
However, highlighting a number of challenges on why some areas are not properly covered during immunisation excercises, she said, “One of the challenges we have is sometimes field workers and the supervisors do not go to areas assigned to them for immunisation coverage.
“They prefer going to places where they are given money leaving other places not properly covered.”
She said to put a stop to this, the vocal persons should be assigned a commercial cyclist who will take vaccinators round to enable them monitor the activities of the supervisors and the field workers during immunisation exercise.
Mrs. Bello also complained of the way the supervisors are appointed. She said, “the supervisors are imposed on us by higher authorities so we have little or no control over them and sometimes immunisation exercise is politicised.”
Mrs. Opeyemi Udulpa, a field worker on immunisation, also complained of the use of nonhealth professionals for immunisation and the short number of days given during immunisation.
“Some of the immunisation officers are not health professionals, they are just trained for about three days after which they are taken to the field and they mess things up also the number of days given for these immunisation should be extended in other to properly go round.
The four days mapped out for Polio vaccination and five days for measles vaccination are not enough.”
A nursing mother who identified herself as Mrs Vivian Igbokwe, expressed discomfort at the high cost of immunisation in the private hospitals, adding that this is the cause of over-crowding in the Primary Health Centers (PHCs) and public hospitals during immunisation exercises.
The importance of immunisation is widely acknowledged. Worthy of note here is that if those children that died in Otodo- Gbame as highlighted in this report have been immunised they would not have died the way they died. Through immunisation a lot of infectious diseases have been averted, according to medical experts.
According to a report issued by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in 2015 with the theme, “Closing the Gap on Immunisation”, “Immunisation averts two to three million deaths worldwide every year. “However, an additional 1.5 million deaths could be avoided if global vaccination coverage improves.
Today, an estimated 18.7 million infants – nearly one in five children – worldwide are still missing routine immunisations for preventable diseases, such as diphtheria, pertussis and tetanus. “More than 60 per cent of children who are unvaccinated live in 10 countries in which Nigeria is among.”
