Anambra State Govt ,Partners To introduce Rotavirus Vaccination Into Routine Immunizations Nov 29

Anambra State Government and its partners, World Health Organization, WHO, and United Nations’ Children’s Fund, UNICEF, are set to introduce Rotavirus vaccination into the routine immunizations on Tuesday November twenty-nine, 2022.

The Executive Secretary, Anambra State Primary Healthcare Development Agency, Dr Chioma Ezenyimulu, announced this in Awka, during a one-day stakeholders’ engagement meeting for Rotavirus vaccine introduction.

Diarrhea diseases caused by Rotavirus is the most common in infants and young children of three and thirty-five months of age and according to WHO, diarrhoealdiseases are the second leading cause of death in children under five years old.

Globally, there are nearly one point seven billion cases of childhood diarrhoeal diseases while five hundred and twenty-five thousand children under five, die from the disease each year and as such, the introduction of the vaccine which began nationwide on August twenty-two, 2022 is to drastically reduce and protect children from the disease.

In Anambra State, the state government through its State Primary Healthcare Development Agency in partnership with its ministry of health, National Primary Healthcare Development Agency, UNICEF and WHO, therefore, held this stakeholders’ engagement to get their buy into the Rotavirus vaccine exercise and to work out a strategy for effective introduction of the vaccine in the state.

The meeting attracted members of the media, civil society organizations, non-governmental and faith-based organizations and community leaders.

Speaking, Dr Ezenyimulu explained that three doses of the vaccine will be administered at sixth, tenth and fourteenth week of every child alongside other routine immunizations at all designated health facilities.

She sought for the support of stakeholders in taking the message down to the grassroots and assured that the vaccine is effective, safe and free of cost.