Oyo state government on Thursday flagged off 2018 measles vaccination campaign, with a target of reaching out to N1.2m children between the ages of nine months to five years.
Speaking during a press conference at the State Ministry of Health in Ibadan, Azeez Adeduntan, Commissioner of Health, noted that vaccination will be carried out in two phases, phase 1 and phase 2.
He said, 17 Local Government Areas (LGAs), will be covered during the first phase of the measles vaccination campaign, which is between 15 -20 march 2018 and 16 LGAs to be covered in the second phase from 22-27 March 2018.
Adeduntan said, “We don’t want to leave anyone behind during the vaccination, that’s why we divided the campaign into two phases. We have social advocate going from house to house to reach out to people in intense areas.
The commissioner explained that vaccination does not kill children and doesn’t affect their mental attitude and advice parents and caregivers to make their children available for vaccination.
He said, “We are here to support the goal of this government to make sure that our mothers and children don’t die prematurely, more or less to achieve global standards in terms of maternal mortality rate and infant mortality rate”.
On the level of security for vaccination team, the commissioner said the government has provided robust security.
He said that there are two different vaccination posts, the fixed pose at the local government areas and Mobile post in churches mosques and palaces.
Lanre Abass, Executive Secretary, Oyo state Primary Health Care Board, noted that 8,000 individuals have been deployed, to serve as vaccinators, town advisers, recorders and social advocate.
He said, this will address the hard to reach areas, “every nook and crannies in Oyo state will be taken care of.
He said, “The house to house advocate about 61 out of the deployed 351 have started moving from house to house since six days ago.
“We are not relying on social mobilizations on television, we move from house to house.
However, Abass, appeals to mothers and caregivers to avail themselves the opportunity of the measles campaign, that every child from nine months to 59 months should take the vaccine from now till next week Tuesday.
