Mogadishu(SONNA)- Ministry of Health,WHO,UNICEF and partners commit to improve Vaccination Coverage against Covid-19 and other vaccine-preventable diseases in Somalia, Vaccines protect us against preventable diseases, including COVID-19.<\/p>\n
They bring us closer to a healthier world and are permissible to be taken during the holy month of Ramadan — these are the main messages the Federal Ministry of Health and Human Services, World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations Children\u2019s Fund (UNICEF) in Somalia are sharing this World Immunization Week, running from 24 to 30 April 2021. On this occasion, the Federal Ministry of Health, WHO and UNICEF are renewing their commitments to ensure that every child is counted for vaccination against vaccine-preventable diseases.<\/p>\n
This year, World Immunization Week comes at a time when the country is conducting one of its largest, much needed\u00a0vaccination campaigns, against COVID-19. Every year, during the last week of April, World Immunization\u00a0Week is observed to encourage the use of vaccines to protect people of all ages against disease. The theme for\u00a0this year is \u2018vaccines bring us closer\u2019 \u2013 to encourage greater global participation around immunization and to\u00a0demonstrate to communities, politicians and other audiences that vaccines do indeed bring families, communities\u00a0and countries closer together.<\/p>\n
With support from the Federal and State Governments of Somalia, WHO, UNICEF and other agencies have been\u00a0providing vaccines \u2013 while observing COVID-19 protocol since last year– to Somalis of all ages and backgrounds \u2013\u00a0against preventable diseases such as measles, pertussis, diphtheria, tetanus, hepatitis B, haemophilus influenza\u00a0type b, cholera, tuberculosis, polio and now against COVID-19.<\/p>\n
Since the resumption of mass vaccination campaigns, which had been paused due to the COVID-19 epidemic in\u00a02020, Somali authorities, with support from WHO, UNICEF and other partners, have conducted five targeted\u00a0campaigns and one nationwide campaign, where approximately three million children were offered vaccines to\u00a0protect them from polio. In addition, 514,567 (83% of the target) and 450,983 (73% of the target) children aged\u00a0under one year received pentavalent 1 and pentavalent 3 vaccines respectively. Overall, 433,863 (70% of the\u00a0target) children aged under one year received their first doses of measles vaccines to protect them against this\u00a0highly infectious disease.<\/p>\n
\u201cSmallpox’s last resting place was in Somalia. But, thanks to concerted and collaborative efforts, we were able to\u00a0eliminate the disease. Polio is on the verge of being eradicated. In reality, with the help of partners, Somalia’s\u00a0circulating poliovirus type 3 (cVDPV3) outbreak was successfully stopped this year, 28 months after it was\u00a0reported, with no further international spread from our country. That should suffice to convince us that we can do it\u00a0again. If we act now and together, we will stop the spread of all vaccine-preventable diseases,\u201d said HE Dr Fawziya\u00a0Abikar Nur, Minister of Health and Human Services, Federal Government of Somalia. \u201cHowever, politicians, our\u00a0foreign and national partners, societies, parents, women, youth, scholars, the private sector, NGOs and donors all\u00a0have a role to play. We should all play a role in ensuring that Somalis receive vaccines appropriate for their age\u00a0groups. Since the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine on 16 March 2021, and until 28 April 2021, 121,743 people in\u00a0Somalia had received their first doses of the Oxford Astra-Zeneca vaccine to protect them from COVID-19. The\u00a0uptake remains considerably low (at 40.6%) though. There is a need to increase the uptake of vaccinations, by\u00a0health workers, frontline workers, elderly populations and people suffering from chronic illnesses, with the first\u00a0batch of 300,000 vaccines — which arrived in the country on 15 March 2021.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are at a critical time, where we can save humanity from the COVID-19 pandemic, especially as we have tools\u00a0like vaccines to protect people. In Somalia, we remain concerned that the current uptake of the vaccine is not\u00a0optimal. The pandemic will not end if it doesn\u2019t end in Somalia and other conflict-affected countries with very weak\u00a0and fragile health systems,\u201d said Dr Mamunur Malik, WHO Representative for Somalia.<\/p>\n
Addressing people\u2019s concerns regarding the uptake of the COVID-19 vaccine during Ramadan, Dr Malik explained,\u00a0\u201cI want to assure people that two Fatwas have been issued by the Al-Azhar Al-Sharif and the International Islamic\u00a0Fiqh Academy (IIFA), the co-chairs of the Islamic Advisory Group. The Fatwas offer advice that it is permissible to\u00a0take COVID-19 vaccinations, as this vaccine goes into the muscles, not bloodstream. We must share information\u00a0with our loved ones and friends about the benefits of vaccination. In the last decade, at least 10 million deaths have\u00a0been prevented by vaccines, and more lives have been saved by vaccines in the history of medicine. Vaccines are\u00a0the most cost-effective health technology ever invested in, during the history of our civilization. We are responsible\u00a0for our health and that of our children. We should support them in accessing vaccines for their age too. No one is\u00a0safe until everyone is safe.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since March 2020, when the first case of COVID-19 pandemic was confirmed, this had an impact on all health\u00a0programmes, including routine immunization. An estimated,186,000 children missed their first doses of the measles\u00a0vaccine in 2020 and around half a million are missing out on polio vaccines, also due to limited access and\u00a0insecurity.<\/p>\n
However, the Government, WHO, UNICEF and partners are working to ensure health facilities and personnel use\u00a0all precautions possible while delivering services.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe devastating COVID-19 pandemic has reminded the world how important and effective vaccines are,\u201d said Mohamed Ayoya, UNICEF Somalia Representative. \u201cVaccines protect us from life-threatening diseases and safeguard our future health. It is critical that we accelerate COVID-19 vaccinations and scale up routine\u00a0immunization especially for children in hard to reach areas. Reaching and protecting these children is a priority.\u201d<\/p>\n
In last quarter of 2021, the Somali Federal Government, WHO and UNICEF and other partners have plans to\u00a0introduce a second dose of inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) and measles vaccines as part of the routine\u00a0immunization programme, now being extended to children older than one year of age. This will boost their\u00a0immunity, particularly in the event they may have missed one dose of measles or polio vaccines when younger<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Mogadishu(SONNA)- Ministry of Health,WHO,UNICEF and partners commit to improve Vaccination Coverage against Covid-19 and other vaccine-preventable diseases in Somalia, Vaccines protect us against preventable diseases, including COVID-19. They bring us closer to a healthier world and are permissible to be taken during the holy month of Ramadan — these are the main messages the Federal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":405270,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-405269","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-local","8":"category-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405269","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=405269"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405269\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":405272,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405269\/revisions\/405272"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/405270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=405269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=405269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=405269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}