Fifty years after the launch of the Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) to universalize access to immunization, Nigeria remains the home to 2.3 million children who have not received any lifesaving vaccines and are at risk of vaccine-preventable infections, even death.
Speaking at a media dialogue in Lagos on Wednesday, UNICEF’s Chief of Field Office for Southwest Nigeria, Celine Lafoucriere, stated that 2.3 million children in Nigeria still have received no vaccines at all.
Lafoucriere declared low vaccine coverage, particularly of children in marginalized areas and hard-to-reach areas, is still a very pressing challenge in Nigeria, although vaccines remain essential to their health.
She stated that vaccines remain an essential fundamental right to every child, and they remain fundamental to improving health outcomes and reducing inequalities, calling on the government and valued partners like the media to join hands to accelerate the rate of immunisation in Nigeria.
To address this challenge, she said that UNICEF, together with the government and its partners, had prioritized accelerating the rate of immunization in 100 LGAs across 18 states with the highest concentration of children who have never received a single dose of routine vaccines.
Lafoucriere added: “We want to ensure that by each year we increase the rate of vaccinated children by 15 percent. We need to have reached 30 percent more vaccinated children by 2025.
“By working collectively, we can build a resilient health system that is capable of reaching every child and even leaving no one behind, no matter where they live, to ensure that no child in Nigeria is suffering from preventable diseases.”
Aderonke Akinwole, a Social and Behaviour Change Specialist at UNICEF, said the availability of free vaccines in primary healthcare centres as part of the Expanded Programme on Immunization Services is to enhance the child’s chance of survival.
She declared that immunization in Nigeria is still faced with many challenges, including poor access to health facilities, inadequate human resources, poor awareness of information about routine immunisation and low demand for vaccines.
While UNICEF continues to strengthen routine immunization in Nigeria so that no child is left unvaccinated, she called for increased government commitment and funding of routine immunization, and heightened community ownership that promotes vaccine trust and demand.
The Assistant Immunisation Programme Officer, Lagos State Primary Health Care Board, Dr Adebayo Adeniji, declared that cases of people who have not received any form of vaccination at all, particularly the migrant population and marginalised youth, are becoming rampant and a thing of concern in Nigeria.
Dr Adeniji declared that unvaccinated people pose health risks and therefore the need for the adoption of interventions that can ensure equitable access to vaccination so that no child is left behind.
“In Lagos State, one of the strategies that we’ve been deploying is the use of mobile vaccination teams, who go to those outreach sites at least once a week to vaccinate people.
“We will be deploying what we call a vaccination tracker. The mothers receive reminders of their children’s vaccination appointments on their phones. What the trackers do is track people that are coming for immunization.”
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